


What We Want

by Blaisdell



Series: What We Want [1]
Category: Original Work
Genre: (implied) - Freeform, (sorry), Anal Fingering, Anal Sex, Angst, Angst and Drama, Angst and Feels, Angst and Fluff and Smut, Angst and Humor, Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Angst and Romance, Angst with a Happy Ending, Anxiety, Anxiety Attacks, Asian-American Character, Blow Jobs, Bottoming, Break Up, Cliche, Cock Tease, Comfort, Crack, Crack and Angst, Cuddling & Snuggling, Dirty Talk, Dirty Thoughts, Disaster Gays, Drama, Drama & Romance, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Ex Sex, Family, Family Dynamics, Feels, Fingerfucking, First Time, First Time Blow Jobs, First Time Bottoming, First Time Topping, Flirting, Fluff, Fluff and Angst, Fluff and Crack, Fluff and Humor, Fluff and Hurt/Comfort, Fluff and Smut, Friendship, Gay Bar, Gay Character, Getting Back Together, Grief/Mourning, Happy Ending, Humor, Hurt/Comfort, Idiots in Love, In more ways than one, LGBTQ Character of Color, Light Dom/sub, M/M, MC gets it up the butt, Minor Character Death, Morning After, Multiple Orgasms, One Night Stands, Orgasm Delay/Denial, Original Character(s), Panic Attacks, Past Relationship(s), Platonic Relationships, Porn With Plot, Porn with Feelings, Recovery, Rimming, Romance, Size Difference, Size Kink, Slow Build, Slow Burn, Slow To Update, Smut, Tight Pants, Young Love, age gap, big dick
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-09-01
Updated: 2021-03-01
Packaged: 2021-03-06 18:21:18
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 7
Words: 74,695
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26243329
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Blaisdell/pseuds/Blaisdell
Summary: Lucky Sommers is living his best life. So what if his best life consists of him (at the sad, sad age of 22) living in his dad's house, not being able to eat avocado toast every morning, and staring longingly at Apple commercials instead of actually drawing something, so he could start making money? He's vibing.He's absolutelynotthinking about his stupid ex.Or the fact that his stupid ex is back in town.Or that his stupid ex is still hot as fuck and maybe Lucky is a bit of a size queen, okay, who isn't, Michael has a great dick, okay?He hates Michael, and he would sooner punch him in the face than sit on his face. Even if Michael apologizes, because there isn't any apology ever that can make up for cheating.Right.It totally doesn't matter that their friends, apparently, are dead-set on getting the two of them back together for some unfathomable, insane reason, because that isneverhappening.Right?
Series: What We Want [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2065677
Comments: 26
Kudos: 34





	1. I Turn Eighteen and Seduce the Biggest Cock on Earth

**Author's Note:**

> Will update once a month provided I can get my head out of my ass and write. Since I know sex sells (or in this case, doesn't sell, but gets me those sweet, sweet views), for the horny lads: porn is in chapters 1 and 7. If you are somewhat innocent and want to keep that innocence (or just... not currently horny/not feeling like reading porn, idk), you can skip C1 and still enjoy some actual plot! You miss nothing except me getting way self-conscious about the amount of times I type out "cock" and "dick." Meanwhile, tragically, C7's porn is kind of instrumental to the plot but if you have at least a couple of spare brain cells you can skip down to the last quarter of the chapter and probably be able to infer what happened. Enjoy! :)

Okay, fine.

Maybe this isn’t an eighteen-plus club, maybe you technically have to be twenty-one to get in.

So maybe I lied about my age because my best friend had pushed a fake ID into my hand and told me to ‘Have fun’ because ‘It’s your birthday’ and I have terrible impulse control and a penchant for making very, very bad decisions.

Or very, very good ones.

It just depends on the angle from which you look at it.

Much like the guy I’m currently ogling.

He’s at the bar, halfway across from where I’m sitting, and honestly, his head keeps disappearing behind a column, which is not making it any easier for me to ogle when the lights are so dark and keep flashing in neon colors and the music is thrumming through my feet and making my eyes hurt.

He looks kind of Asian.

At least, I think so, from where I’m perched, trying not to fall off the bar stool and waiting for a drink that I’ve ordered that I don’t plan on drinking because I’ve had alcohol before and, honestly, it’s not really worth it.

He might be Latino, though. Some Latinos look Asian. It really throws me off my vibe when I’m trying to categorize different nationalities of people at the Dragon Star Supermarket, though identification has never been my strong suit anyway since I’m adopted and have basically grown up around one-hundred-percent Caucasians who say things like “bayg” instead of “bah-guh” and “o yea you betcha!” instead of “yes,” like _normal people_.

(Note: it is _not_ spelled ‘ _c-o-c-k-a-s-i-a-n_ ’ no matter how it might sound. Googling the two things will bring you two _very_ different results.)

His head comes out from behind the column. He has a frown pressed across his face—he has since I first noticed him. He has short, short hair, buzzed close to his head but just a tiny bit longer on top than it is on the sides and back and high cheekbones that look like they could slice salami. Dark, angry eyebrows. Black eyes.

Black button-down, with just enough buttons undone for me to start to see the tan of his defined pectorals (which actually just look sickly green when the colored lights swipe over him, because I can’t actually see if he’s tan, and thus am assuming), over which is a thin sports jacket, shoved up at the sleeves because—

Muscles.

Holy fuck, the muscles.

I want to lick them.

He’s not all jacked up like the guys on ’roids (I can see two of them in the corner, grinding with a twink who has an ass larger than Brazil), because I don’t find that synthetic crap attractive—or healthy—but he’s lean in a way that suggests he probably spends every morning in the gym, lifting weights or whatever it is that gym-going people do. For an hour.

Maybe more.

I want to bite his biceps.

He could probably hold me down no sweat.

That makes me shiver, in a nice way, and my dick stirs in my pants and I almost glare at it because I’m pretty sure that these pants are so tight that if I do so much as fart, they’ll shred.

His buddy, a pale man with pale hair and pale eyes who’s come up to him in within the past ten minutes and is muttering all whilst smooshing his cheek in his hand and looking very grumpy about the number of shots he’s doing (the current count is at six, in my opinion he should slow down before he gets alcohol poisoning) leans toward Mr. Yes Please’s ear. Jerks his head in my direction.

Caught.

I flush; jerk my head away before I can see what Mr. Yes Please’s reaction is.

But then peek back because the _Fuck, Man, I Really Want to Get Laid_ mood that’s been very persistent lately bares its teeth and sends my embarrassment to cower in a corner, tail between its legs.

Mr. Yes Please is looking at me.

If that doesn’t send a thrill through my veins.

I don’t know if he’s interested: I can’t tell, he’s too far away, and his eyes are only flashes of black and white that I can’t read at all from here.

I cast a glance around, high on my barstool throne. Scope out my path, because I’m fully aware the second I get off this oaken monstrosity that holds me at most peoples’ normal head-height, my five-two-and-a-half build is going to be absolutely lost in the throbbing, pulsing mass of flesh that is actually several hundred bodies packed together, screaming and bouncing in sync to RuPaul.

RuPaul doesn’t look like he’s having any effect on Mr. Yes Please. His face is still stony and hard and he’s still got both elbows propped up on the bar.

I slip off my stool.

Force my way through countless sweat-sticky bodies.

This isn’t really my zone: fine, I’ll admit it, I’m not exactly one hundred percent comfortable, but some things will have to be sacrificed if I want a dick up my butt tonight because the only other gay guys I know are scraggly teenagers who are either too skinny, too flabby, or have rat-mustaches, and smell like moldy tater tots or far too much AXE body spray, and that is _not_ the kind of vibe I want for my first time.

 _Go big or go home_ , Collie likes to say.

She’s my best friend.

She’s amazing.

I can feel my phone vibrating in the pocket against my ass—she’s probably texting me right now, but I honestly don’t think I can pry my phone out without ripping my pants and shredding the remains of my dignity.

I have to elbow my way past a lesbian who looks like she could rip my dick off with just her pinkie before I’m smashed up against the bar next to him.

He’s not wearing a sports jacket, it’s a thin leather jacket, which is definitely more sexy.

“Hey,” I say, my voice coming out far more confident than I feel, because my stomach is kind of twisting up inside with nervousness before I shove my hands down and tell myself, _No expectations, no disappointments_ , because he could be straight—which would, admittedly, be pretty weird for a gay club, but not that weird. Or he could be bi but prefer women.

Or just prefer anybody but me.

But I’m everyone’s type, if the number of invitations to go out with other teenagers in my school is any indication. Honestly, the number keeps going up, and it’s so annoying. Everyone in high school is so _immature_. I’ll never date anyone my age or younger.

He looks at me, like he’s surprised that I’ve appeared here, and the butterflies in my insides die a prompt death, and I’m pretty sure I’m dying, too, because he is five hundred times hotter up close because he’s super fucking tall (read: normal height, I’m just super fucking short) and vascular and he’s got glare-y eyes that are turning me inside-out and making my legs go wobbly.

“Wow.” His friend leans in front of the bar so he can stare like I’m some zoo animal. “I wasn’t aware the elementary school was having a field trip tonight.”

It takes me a second to decipher all of his words because now Adam Lambert is hollering about stripper heels and Maseratis, but when I do, I scowl.

Then I scowl more because Mr. Yes Please has a faint look of amusement fluttering around his full lips (that I want to suck on), like I’m a joke.

“Excuse you,” I say. “I’m legal.”

The pale man—is he albino? He looks pale enough to be albino, no person is quite so white, he glows like a ghost almost—squints. “Are you sure? You look like you just turned twelve.”

“And you’ve just downed so many shots that I’d be surprised if you could even distinguish a twelve-year-old from a platypus.”

It’s out before I can stop myself, and I have to refrain from slapping a hand over my mouth in horror.

What have I said about me and bad decisions?

The man cackles like he’s just heard the funniest joke in the world. “Well, it doesn’t matter,” he says. “You’re not here for me, are you?”

I eye him. He’s not unattractive: he’s a little more slender than Mr. Yes Please but still muscled, with pale, almond eyes that say, _I’m Chinese, too_ and short-cropped hair.

“Why?” I ask. “Are you asking for a friend or asking for yourself? I can buy you a drink.”

“Do you even have money?”

“I have a job,” I say, offended. “I’m a lifeguard at the community center.”

The albino laughs, his head tilted toward the ceiling, long throat bared. “Oh my lord, you work at the _community center_? This is surreal.” His eyes skewer me in place when he turns, and his voice turns low and husky. “How bendy are you, mister lifeguard?” He smirks, but then Mr. Yes Please plants a hand square on the side of his friend’s face and shoves him away, almost making him fall off his stool. He turns to me and sticks me with a glare that would probably fry anyone else right where they stood but instead has my dick going _I want that look plastering me to the bed_ which, honestly—Yeah.

It’s making my mouth go dry.

I have to start thinking about maggots and licking someone’s toes and Anthony Fauci’s voice to keep myself from sprouting a boner in front of five hundred people and also the most attractive dude I’ve ever seen in my life.

“Stop hitting on my friend,” he growls.

It takes a minute for speech to return as one of my abilities as a normal, functioning human being, because that’s _hot_. “Why? I’m bored.”

“Be bored somewhere else. This club is twenty-one up, darling, I don’t know how you got in.”

“I’m going to take that as a compliment.” I shoot him a sticky-sweet smile. Then I get a horrible idea. “Are you two _together_?” Fuck, I don’t want a threesome.

I don’t think I’m ready for a threesome.

I don’t think I ever want to _experience_ a threesome. Where would all the hands go? And the _feet_?

The albino man is laughing. “No,” he wheezes. “Oh my god, Michael, I’ve changed my mind: if he doesn’t sit on your dick, I want him.”

Of course, all my brain hears is _Your dick_ and I just pray that I don’t drool because—his dick. If he’s this gorgeous, his dick probably is, too. Either that or it looks like a worm with eczema. From my experience with porn, dicks are either beautiful or horrendous, there is no in-between.

Mr. Yes Please wants me to sit on his dick.

I am inordinately pleased.

Mr. Yes Please—no, Michael, his name is _Michael_ —swears and knocks back what’s left of his drink, standing from the bar.

“No one’s getting him,” he says. “He’s probably just a sixteen-year-old thrill-seeker. Get lost, kid. Bryce, I’ll see you tomorrow and I can’t wait to laugh at your predicament when you have to explain your wonderful new idea to the PR department while under the influence of a killer migraine.”

The albino shoots him a mock salute, already reaching for another shot.

Mr. Yes Please starts to slip away.

Fuck.

No.

The collar of my shirt yanks against my throat and then the albino—Bryce—is dragging me close, his lips scraping the shell of my ear and sending shivers down my neck, and I can smell the tart whiskey lacing his breath. “Go chase after him, kid,” he says. “He’s been stuck in a dry spell recently, and he couldn’t keep his eyes off your butt.”

I pull away, wide-eyed, and Bryce snickers drunkenly.

“That is,” he calls, “assuming that you _are_ actually legal.”

The ends of his words trail off, because I’m already punching my way through the crowd, following the drag trail of emptiness that Mr. Yes Please leaves behind him.

I’m calling out by the time I stumble out of the doors to the club and cool spring air is slapping my face; the bouncers have probably seen enough drunk kids in their day to assume I’m one of them, because they don’t give me so much as a second glance, and before I know it, we’re halfway down the sidewalk.

“Hey.”

He doesn’t stop. “ _You_ still?”

“Yeah.” I grab ahold of his sleeve, and he turns—fast, faster than I thought he’d move, and I’m suddenly up against the brick side of the club, my arm pressed against the cold stone and him against my chest and he smells like the remnants of the club—sweat, alcohol—and something a little sweeter and sultry, like jasmine maybe.

He’s not holding me tight, but I can still feel the curl of his fingers against my skin, tight enough to warn, _Don’t try any funny business_ , and he is far, far taller than me, by more than a head, but he’s still breathing down my neck and glaring and it’s sending all my blood from my brain down to my dick, which is honestly not helpful while I’m trying to seduce a gorgeous, cranky man.

“Are you drunk?” he demands. “Why are you so persistent?”

I open my mouth. Close it. Then: “I’m from Minnesota. You have to offer at least three times if you’re being genuine.”

I think I catch a flicker of something dark and dangerous and a little bit sexy in his eyes, like he could push me up against a wall and maul my neck—and then my brain helpfully supplies that we’re pretty much halfway there, which does nothing to help the situation in my pants.

“And how many times have you offered already?” His voice is a little deeper. Husky.

 _Please eat me_ , my mind says. _Deflower me. Anything you want. Ask it in that voice and I’m yours._

“Uh.” I flounder. “I lost count.”

He doesn’t miss a beat. “So?”

I’m still against the wall of the club. He’s still in front of me.

If this doesn’t end in sex, it’s still going to be part of my masturbatory fantasies for two months _at least_. The moon is shining on his muscles and on his cheekbones and he looks like he’s cut out of quartz and I wish that high school was full of boys like this, even though it could never be because he looks like he’s out of college at least, but no older than thirty.

I don’t know what to say. _Wanna fuck?_ sounds a little _too_ crass, but all the other options crawling desolately through my hormonal, sex-starved brain are pretty much just as bad.

“I’ll sit on your dick,” I finally offer, after a length of time that takes so long I’m surprised he doesn’t up and leave me, ass down, on the sidewalk.

He snorts. “I’m not interested.” He’s lying, though. I can see his eyes, picking apart every single part of me, from my stupid pants (Collie’s idea) to the shirt, which is also stupidly fucking tight (also Collie’s idea)—so tight that I’m pretty sure that if I keep standing out here in the cold, my nipples are going to become pointy erasers and poke right through the fabric.

I let my eyes go down to his crotch. He _has_ to be packing, if his bulge is any indication. “I am.”

“It takes two to tango, darling,” he says.

“Okay, but you’re still scoping me out.” Because he _had_ been and the _He likes your butt_ from Bryce still lingers in the back of my mind.

He scowls, clearly not a friend of being guilty.

Lets go of my arm.

Starts back down the sidewalk.

“Wait, wait, wait.” I’m trotting after him, because I’m stupid, and it’s like one in the morning, and even though I’m supposed to be at a birthday sleepover with Collie right now, she drove me down here and told me to get laid and I hate the taste of defeat.

“What.”

“What do you want?”

He half-looks behind him. “What do you mean, what do I want?”

“What do you want?” I say. “That’s not a hard question. For example: I want dick.”

He snorts, and it sounds a little bit like aborted laughter.

“Maybe I want what you can’t give me,” he rumbles. I think he’s walking a bit slower, but that might be my imagination. Either that, or we’re getting close to his car.

“I don’t have a gag reflex,” I blurt. Which is a lie. A big, fat lie, because I choked on my toothbrush just that morning when I hit my molars a little bit too hard and then again during lunch when I was trying to stuff the last of a corndog down my throat and the wooden poker stick thing hit my uvula. But it’s not super bad, and if I hold my thumb in my fist, I can kind of control it, and yes, fine, so I’ve shoved a dildo in my mouth before and I’d like to imagine that I’ll be better at sucking dick than I am at brushing my teeth and eating corndogs.

I hear this little throaty noise come from him, carried by the air.

 _Come on, please_ , I wish, because I want this: I want this ‘happy birthday’ present that’s all for me, from me, to me, just me. Also, my hand’s been cramping with how much I’ve been jacking off recently and I only have one dildo and it’s getting boring and I’m too scared to go online and get another one because I don’t want my parents to find it if they go out to get the mail before me.

He chuffs a little breath, sounding more annoyed with himself than he is with me. “Fine.”

It takes a second to register, and then literal stars go off behind my eyes. “ _Really_ —”

He turns only to point a finger at me. “Don’t make me regret it.”

I kick the stars into a black hole. “No, no, absolutely not,” I say, trying not to let my giddiness show on my face. “Nope. No, sir.” My heart’s just picked up to three thousand beats per minute. I might actually die before we even do anything, because I’m already thinking about how he might touch me, and how I want to touch him, and how yeah, maybe I _do_ have a gag reflex, but I still want to suck his dick.

And then sit on his dick.

Yeah.

Hot fuck.

So I follow him to his car, trying not to squeal like a hog being gutted, and his car ends up being a classy black Prius at the end of the block, because of _course_ he owns a Prius and cares about the environment because he’s got to be hot _and_ a good person.

Shit, I’m so screwed.

A nervous laugh bubbles out of me.

He glances over from the driver’s seat as I’m buckling in. “You _are_ legal, right?”

“Ha ha, a little late to be asking now, isn’t it? You’re stuck with me, now.”

He narrows his eyes and I realize how that sounds, so I backtrack quickly and nod faster than a bobblehead doll.

“Yeah. Yep. Yes, sir, absolutely one hundred percent legal.”

I think I hear him say, “Because that doesn’t sound suspicious at all,” under his breath, but I’m not entirely sure.

He pulls onto the street, clicking the headlights on.

“You better pray that I don’t turn out to be a murderer,” he says.

“I’m not worried,” I say.

“Oh?”

“Have you ever met a hhhi— _student_ —who hasn’t wanted to die before? Honestly, sex or death, works either way for me.” I aim for jovial and probably go too far and hit hysterical.

He shoots me a look, but doesn’t push it. Probably because of my superior sense of humor.

“What’s your name?”

“Is this interrogation time?” escapes my mouth.

He shoots an amused look through the mirror. “This is me extending human decency to the man I’m about to sleep with.”

I shiver a bit. _Man._ I haven’t really thought of myself like that before.

It’s weird.

 _Man_.

“Alright?”

“Uh, yeah. Yeah. Um. I’m Lucky. Lucky Sommers. But my real name is—”

_Fuck._

_No._

_Abort._

_Not good plan—_

My mouth clicks shut.

It takes him about half a second to realize I’ve stopped intentionally. He cuts a look at me.

“Is what?”

I shake my head, eyes wide and mouth resolutely shut. No, no, absolutely not. It’s so embarrassing, the only reason it slipped out is because I’m such a teacher’s pet, and I’m used to the routine of having to point out my legal name on the roster because ‘Lucky’ is never on there. It’s even worse because it’s _him_ and he’s hot and probably Asian, so he’ll know what it means—

“Is what?”

He says it in that deep, growly voice, and my dick says _Hello, sailor_ , and my traitorous fucking mouth squeaks out, “Ming Mei.”

_Fuck._

I think I might see his lips twitch, but he’s looking away through the mirror while he merges lanes and then turns from a bright city street to a more dimly-lit one.

“That’s a girl’s name.”

“I know!” I snap, before I can help it. “I know that! My parents are _white_ , you asshole, they adopted me just born, and they thought it was a pretty name because it was on a placemat when they went to Jin’s Chow Mein and—”

Horrified at the verbal diarrhea that’s coming out of my mouth, I stuff my fingers in my mouth.

It takes one-point-five seconds for the laughter. It’s not laughter, not really, it’s actually a very amused curl of his lips and a soft chuckle which, if I didn’t already have half an erection, would probably do the trick.

“Your parents named you after a placemat at a place called ‘Jin’s Chow Mein.’”

“Fuck you,” I mumble around my fingers.

“You can do that later,” he says smoothly, and if that doesn’t stop my brain. Because _holy shit_. I hadn’t thought of _that_.

He pulls into a parking lot; a parking space.

“This is my apartment.”

I look at him, and then I realize my fingers are still in my mouth, and I’m in the car of what has got to be the hottest guy in the world and I’m sucking on my fingers after just admitting to him that I have a girl’s name because, yes, ok _ay_ , I was named after a placemat at Jin’s Chow Mein. It wasn’t _my_ fault my parents had decided adopting a little Chinese boy made them hungry for Chinese and the waiter at the restaurant didn’t really speak good English and they didn’t get the point that girls were usually named after flowers and nice, sensual, sweet, obedient, pretty things.

Whatever.

It didn’t mean anything to me.

(I should be named after something hardcore, like a dragon on fire or something like that. I don’t really know how it works.)

“Uh. Okay.” I pull my fingers out of my mouth and his eyes flicker; I wipe them on my jeans without thinking and scramble for the door. Belt. Wait, belt first.

I’m a functioning human being, I don’t know what you’re talking about.

“What’s _your_ name, then?” I ask, challenging, as we walk up to the lobby.

“Michael.”

“I already knew _that_.”

He shoots me an amused look as he unlocks the door and holds it open for me. “Were you hoping for something exotic, like being named after a particularly good bagger at the farmer’s market?”

He’s still talking, giving the ‘fuck you’ no chance to leave my mouth.

“If so, you’re out of luck. I’m Michael Quentin Scott.”

I’m quiet for a little. “That’s very… white,” I say eventually. Carefully.

“Blame my fosters,” he says mildly, giving nothing away. Because his cheekbones and his eyes shout _I’m Asian!_ while his nose and his jawline sultrily whisper, _But not entirely._

I don’t say anything to that, so we spend the trip across the lobby and in the elevator in silence, which weighs heavily on my ears and presses in on me, trying to urge me to talk. I don’t really want to puke my life’s story all over a stranger, though, even if he is pretty nice and hotter than all the gods I don’t believe in, so I tell my brain to stuff it.

His apartment is right next to the elevator, and I almost point this out and say, “That’s nice, you can get out quick if there’s a fire,” before I realize you’re not supposed to take the elevator in the case of an emergency, so I let my fingers scrabble at my pockets for a second before I give up, because these stupid pants are too damn tight.

I will curse Collie later, because apparently my ass looks good in them and Michael Quentin Scott likes my ass in tight pants.

“Are you going to stand out there forever?”

 _Shit_ , my brain says, and I start having second thoughts. What if he actually _doesn’t_ like me? What if he changes his mind? What if I can’t get hard and then he doesn’t want to get it on and then sends me home? What if—

_Not helpful!_

“Uh. Not long, ha ha—”

But then he’s hauling me inside, and I catch a glimpse of a neat kitchen, everything organized and filled with a ton of Japanese kitsch ( _Is he kawaii?_ my brain asks unhelpfully despite the fact that I don’t know what kawaii is or even means, I’ve heard it used in conversation _three_ times, twice by Collie and once by her brother).

“Shoes off,” he growls, and I somehow manage that before I’m shoved against the wall and his mouth is on my mouth and wow, those fumblings under the bleachers will never, ever compare to this, and also—Why had I even been worried in the first place?

I’ll never be able to kiss anyone else ever again.

He’s sucking on my lips and on my tongue like he’s a goddamned vacuum cleaner and lips are soft—a lot softer than I thought they would be, and not oily with lipstick like Danielle’s had been, or chapped like Emmett’s had been, or sticky and dry like Josh’s had been—and pretty soon they’re spit-slick because I’m pretty sure I’m trying to eat his face back. I’m not actually sure how I’m still standing, because by all rights this feels so good that I’m pretty sure I’ve died and achieved nirvana, but then I realize he’s got a knee between my legs, which is awesome—better than awesome, really, it’s fantastic—and there’s definitely absolutely zero blood left in my brain, because I can feel my dick outlined in my pants, trapped against cotton and polyester and I’m grinding against his leg like a whore and trying to undo the remaining buttons on his shirt, which is difficult because I’m definitely, totally, one hundred percent distracted.

He removes his mouth to bite my jaw, which is really fucking hot because holy shit: this is another, real person, and we’re going to have sex.

Fuck yeah.

He draws his teeth down the edge of my ear and I make a high-pitched noise that I will deny to my dying day; his hands are at the hem of my shirt, peeling it up inch by inch, and he’s _touching_ , and I might not have huge-ass muscles like him but I do push-ups and sit-ups and curls in my room _sometimes_ , cut me some slack, I only hit puberty like five years ago, he’s probably had at least ten to be working on what he’s got right now.

“Oh god,” I gasp.

Why’s he still wearing clothes?

I have to deal with that.

I don’t really get the chance, though, because he’s hauling me past the entry, and there’s a brief second where _I_ ’m pressing _him_ up against the door to his room, his jacket tossed somewhere I don’t really care about and his shirt half undone, up on my tip-toes to sink my teeth into the juncture between his neck and shoulder.

He makes this growly noise that reverberates through his chest, like he’s pleased, and my dick decides that it likes pleasing him.

A lot.

And then his door swings open and he has a red semicircle on his skin—hickey, I’ve just given him a hickey—and he flips us so that he’s stalking me into his bedroom, which is also very neat and nice and home to a queen-sized bed with silken chocolate covers.

“Lucky,” he purrs, dragging out my name into something special, and he’s a completely different person from that ice statue at the bar, because his eyes are smoldering and he’s looking at me like I’m melting ice cream that he needs to lick off each and every one of his fingers.

“Uh huh?” manages to squeak out before I feel the back of my knees against his mattress.

“What do you want?” He discards his shirt, and my mouth goes dry, because nipples. And _muscles_. He has abs, and a thin, perfect train of hair that trails from his belly button down to the hem of his pants, teasing of what might hide down there. Tantalizing. And his pants are definitely nowhere near as tight as mine but they’re definitely getting snug in certain areas, specifically, his crotch and I kind of want a little bit of help because I’ve never done this before, and yeah, it’s totally the hottest thing ever, but there’s maybe also this little curl of nervousness in my gut.

“Hhhh,” is the only thing that escapes my mouth, though, because suddenly he’s stepped closer, and I can feel the heat radiating out from his skin and yeah, I can see in the normal light now that he is actually tan, of course he is, he probably spends tons of time outside, hiking and biking and doing _manly_ things.

 _Could fuck outside_ , my brain offers.

_Go away._

He buries his hands into my hair and tugs just a little bit, and it helps: he’s here in front of me, and that’s all I need to focus on because he’ll probably be more than a handful.

And then his fingernails scrape down my scalp and I don’t even need to worry about my thoughts anymore because I’m pretty sure all of them implode on the spot as the best lot of shivers I’ve ever had shoots down my spine and back.

My dick might actually bust through my pants, I’m so hard.

And then he twists his hands, and there’s pain, sharp and bright but not really a bad thing at all, and he pushes me down and my knees are jelly so I go rather willingly and then his crotch is in front of me and I think, _Huh, this probably isn’t so bad after all_.

I glance up, wanting permission, and almost fall over because he’s staring at me with this hungry look, like he could devour me whole and I hadn’t thought looks could be sexy before, but apparently I was wrong because _that_ look makes me feel like I could come in my pants.

Which I pray doesn’t happen because that would be worse than embarrassing.

Instead of worrying about that, I pop the button on his jeans.

Undo his fly.

He’s wearing black underwear that is super, super sexy and also super, super tiny and honestly I don’t know how it’s holding in—

His dick.

I kind of do this scrabble-thing to pull his underwear down and then holy fucking shit.

His dick is the biggest thing I’ve ever seen I swear to god, and I am _so_ fucked (literally) because—because—Wow, do I feel inadequate now, because this guy is the goddamn Alexander the Great of dicks, and I’m just an ordinary foot soldier. Because my dick is just normal sized. You know, like a _normal person_. _This_ dick is at least nine inches. It is a porn-star dick. I have to wonder whether or not he _does_ porn, because that would be _hot_ , and I kind of want to look him up to see, but then he kind of tugs on my hair a bit, reminding me of where I am, and I can tell that he’s getting a little impatient so I yank down his clothes the rest of the way (I was only panicking a _little_ ) and wrap a hand around the base of his enormous fucking cock.

It’s hot, and hard, and throbbing a little, and I’m pretty sure in sex ed they told us to use condoms but they never specified if that should include oral sex or not (because everyone had been too horrified to ask after the teacher used a banana to show how to put one on) and before he can even open his mouth (because he does, but I never hear what he says) I lick the tip of his dick and then put my mouth around it.

I hear the click of his throat as he swallows. I’m stuck there for a second, my mouth around his cock, and then my brain reminds me that I actually need to move to do something, which is harder than it sounds because I’m pretty sure my mouth is opened wider than when I went to the orthodontist and they used those stupid clear plastic lip spreader things to keep me open so they could take my braces on and then off two years later—and slide down a little.

Slowly.

Tentatively.

Because, _fine_ , so I’ve never actually given a blowjob to a living human being and although I’ve watched porn, they don’t really do an x-ray and show you what’s going on in a person’s mouth.

But, y’know, it’s fine, because Michael grunts out this noise that kind of sounds like _Yeah_ and tugs me down farther on his cock and then I’m choking and yanking back because I need to breathe.

“Sorry.” Half his dick is shiny now and there’s a thin spiderweb of spit connecting the tip to my bottom lip. I kind of wonder if anyone has ever gotten his whole dick in their mouth.

Anyway, I don’t _really_ care, not that much, so I lean forward to try again and I think I’m kind of figuring it out, because his breathing is definitely a lot rougher now and some of the awkwardness is gone and my dick is back to straining at my pants like it wants to be let out because he smells like soap and musk, like he washed before going to the club, and I dimly think _That’s nice, at least I’m not sucking a dirty cock_.

So I’m kind of slobbering over his cock because it’s huge and my jaw is aching and there isn’t really any room in my mouth to do any fancy stuff (so _what_ if the dentist told me have a small mouth, okay, I’m not weird like Collie is where she can do this thing where she opens her mouth wide enough to stuff her fist in there, which is creepy) and faint salty taste of his precome is spread all over my tongue. My hand is still at the base of his dick, and I’m still, like, two inches away from it and not even close to putting my nose in his pubes like they do in porn but before my brain can get any fancy ideas and tell me to just _try_ deep-throating him, it can’t be that hard, right?, he’s prying me off, and my brain goes back into panic mode because _Is this where we fuck?_ and there is absolutely no fucking way that gigantic thing can fit inside of me.

No, though, he just looks down at me, and there’s this aura of amusement that’s pulsing off him.

 _It’s not the only thing that’s pulsing_ , my brain says, and I tell it to fuck off.

“Is this the first time you’ve sucked dick?”

I open my mouth to protest, because you know what, I think I’m doing fine, I’m figuring it out—

“Inanimate phallic objects don’t count,” he says, and his hands are still in my hair, so at least that means he doesn’t want to kick me out, right?

“At least tell me I’m making a good _attempt_ ,” I grumble, sliding my hand up his dick, because it’s easier to focus on that than it is on his eyes.

“Your enthusiasm is touching,” he rumbles, and his hand is doing this thing where it’s kind of creeping behind my ear and I’m shivering and trying to lean into his touch because it feels insanely good and my eyes are half-closing of their own accord so I can’t summon the energy to pout. So instead my vocal cords decide to make an annoying noise that sounds suspiciously like a whimper and Michael says, “Open your mouth.”

I do, because he’s using _that voice_ and apparently I’m a lot easier to boss around than I thought. His dick is back in my mouth and it’s not _as_ difficult anymore because he’s telling me what he likes and ordering me around and that makes the little niggling voice at the back of my head shut up in its worrying of whether or not he enjoys what I’m doing.

My mouth is on his cock until he’s panting (which I take huge pride in) and he drags me up and kisses me. I topple over onto the bed because he’s leaning forward and I can only concentrate so much on balance when he’s trying to lick my tonsils and his hand is actually on my dick through my pants and he’s not stopping me from thrusting against him.

“Your pants are ridiculous,” he growls, biting my bottom lip before licking away the sting.

“My friend picked them out.”

“Are they painted on, or what?” He drags open my fly with a smooth, practiced move, and yanks them down so fast I think I hear a seam rip. It doesn’t really matter, though, because cold air suddenly surrounds my dick, which joins the party by bobbing above my stomach, flushed with blood and glistening from sweat and precome.

“You like it,” I accuse, and he doesn’t deny anything. He scoots his hands up my shirt and I raise my arms so he can shove it off and toss it somewhere behind him. He puts a hand on my chest, and I’m kind of stuck to the bed at this point, and then he bites my nipple, and never mind, I was never stuck to the bed, because I arch right off and pretty much all but beg him to keep going while he wrangles my pants off and jacks me off at the same time, making me a moaning mess, which makes me wonder what’s wrong with me because I’ve never had any trouble with being quiet in the past, when my parents were only a thin wall away.

I can hear angles about to sing the hallelujah chorus when he pulls away from me, and the loss of his body heat is like a drop-kick, so I whimper. My eyes pry themselves open.

He’s kneeling on the edge of the bed, looking me up and down. I’m sure I look less than presentable. My eyes are probably dinner plates, and if the way _he_ looks is indication, my lips are red and swollen from our kissing and I’m sweaty and my hair is going every single direction and my dick is so hard that it could probably cut diamonds and is oozing all over my stomach.

“Uh,” I say articulately and I let my knees fall open. Everyone knows what that means, right?

Right, because his eyes go dark and he’s staring right there and his cock is really fucking hard, too, and also probably big enough to resemble a small limb if he really wanted it to.

 _Imagine what that’ll feel like_.

 _Really fucking good_.

_Or he’ll split you open like a bullet tearing through Play-Doh and you’ll bleed all over and have to go to the emergency room and your parents will—_

He grabs my balls and brain short-circuits. Actually, ‘grab’ is kind of a bad word for what happens, because he’s holding them, and yeah, fine, I waxed everywhere (worst experience of my fucking life), because Collie told me that I'm a twink (which I was very offended by; I'm not a _twink_ , I'm just small, okay?) and all the gay men who are into twinks like said twinks looking like naked mole rats, but maybe it hadn’t been a mistake because everything is a whole lot more sensitive and when he rolls them in his hand and then runs his fingers down my taint I’m actually pretty surprised that I don’t come on the spot because I’m a teenager and I only have so much self-control. As it is, I spread my legs farther apart and his fingers are dangerously close to my asshole and I think I’m urging him on with little breathy “Yeah, yeah, yeah”s that are just falling out of my mouth, and the only reason I’m not worried about shitting straight into his hand is because I did like three enemas before I left the house (which turned out to be worse than the waxing, but y’know, this is really making it worth it).

He takes his fingers away.

“No,” I whine.

He’s kind of smirking, like he knew he could do this to me, but he wasn’t entirely sure, and he enjoys having the confirmation all too much. “I need you coherent, darling.”

I glare, because I want to get back to the sexytime.

“What do you want?” he says, yanking me farther up on the bed and jerking with the sheets so he can kick them into a corner. He licks one of his hands, looking at me while he does it; uses the other to smooth across my chest, my stomach. Wraps his licked hand around my dick, and I try to thrust up because it’s hot and tight and wet and this is honestly probably the longest I’ve ever lasted and I want to _come_.

He’s at my neck, kind of mouthing along the skin, like he wants to give me a mark but isn’t sure if he should or not.

“You can fuck me,” he says, like I can pay attention while he’s all over me, which is a laughable idea. Somehow, the words register, dimly, and my mind is kind of fizzing out right now because it tries to think that if his hand feels like _that_ , imagine what—

“Or,” he says, not done, “I can fuck you.”

Which is also more than tempting, because if a dildo and my fingers up my butt are anything to be believed, prostates are amazing and I also like it when things are in my ass.

But I kind of want it all. It’s like someone offering me mac and cheese and sugar cookies at the same time but saying I can only have one or the other; I can’t possibly choose.

He must be able to read my face, because he says, “You can’t have both _right now_ ,” and then bites my lip when I pout at him.

And then we’re making out again, but three seconds later I have to thrash away from him, which takes all of my self-control and makes half of me hate the other half, and I’m gasping out, “Stop, stop, I’m gonna—gonna—” which must be pretty telling so he lets go of my dick and it slaps, angry red and straining, against my pale stomach, making me groan.

“So?” he says.

I shake my head. If I breathe any faster I’m going to hyperventilate. “Don’t care.”

“Pick anyway.” His hands are on my legs, stroking and scraping with his nails, which is almost as good as having him on my dick, and he’s not doing it on purpose but he’s coaxing my legs apart at the same time and staring at my crotch hungrily, like he likes me that way, spread for him, and my dick is leaving leaky wet trails across my stomach.

“Fuck me,” I say, and hope I won’t regret it later. “Please.”

His fingers are petting along the insides of my thighs and it feels like electricity and something’s buzzing under my skin and I had thought touching was overrated before now—why did you need to run your hands all over someone else when you could just stick your dick in them—but all my fantasies have undergone an immediate reshuffling because this is the new best thing.

“Okay,” he says, and we’re kissing again and I’m helplessly trailing my hands over him because his skin is so, so hot, and silky, and covering hard muscle and soft flesh alike. He tears himself away to scramble across the bed to grab whatever he’s going to grab from his dresser and leaves me on the bedspread, panting and rocking up into air. He’s back within a second, speedy. His fingers are slippery and cold, but not cold for long, and then they’re up my ass and it feels a lot better than when I do it because his fingers are longer and he has a better angle and _he_ ’s probably had sex before because it takes him like three-point-two seconds to find my prostate and I’m clutching at his forearm and moaning and trying to push down on his fingers, and then his mouth is on my neck and I think I’m chanting something about him biting me because he sinks his teeth into my skin and then sucks—and it hurts; it stings, and I kind of want to get away, but it’s also sending the blood buzzing straight through my head and then back down to my dick and I like it far more than I thought I would. I don’t know what he’s doing with my asshole, but it feels really, really good and I immediately start making plans for having more sex all the time because if it’s like this, why have I even waited so long?

I’m moaning, “Hurry up, hurry up,” and then he’s fumbling at a condom wrapper, his fingers still slippery, until I finally steal it from his possession and rip it open and then both of us are trying to put it on him at the same time and my fingers are sticky-slick with the lube from the condom and he’s groaning into my mouth, shoving me onto the mattress, pushing my legs back until I get the hint enough to hold them up by myself and then one of his hands is pressing me into me just enough so that I feel the pleasant weight on my chest.

Even though my body’s going _Yes, yes, yes_ and is totally on board, and my dick is hard and is _definitely_ on board, my brain goes: _Hold on!_

_What?_

_You should probably tell him you’ve never done this before_ , my brain says.

 _That wouldn’t be helpful!_ I think.

_So you want to die on his cock?_

_I’m not going to die!_

_He looks like he wants to rip you apart_ , my brain points out. Which is kind of true, because he’s lining up his dick and his eyes are all black with desire and there’s a tiny curl is sticking to his forehead and he’s biting his lower lip and _damn_ , that’s hot. And then the head of his dick is at my hole and I—

“Wait, wait, wait,” I gasp.

He pauses. “Why?”

 _Yes, why?_ my brain says, suddenly doing a complete one-eighty and giving me whiplash.

“I—uh—”

He squints at me.

I’m sweating, and it’s not from doing sexy things.

“You’ve done this before, right?” he asks, and then at my guilty silence, “Are you a _virgin_?”

“Uh—”

His eyes go all wide. “Dear _Christ_ ,” he says. “How old even _are_ you?”

I squirm a bit under his hand, but he doesn’t pick up any of his weight, and I can’t go anywhere. “Uh. Twenty-one?” I say, because that’s what it says on my fake ID, and I can lie; I’m great at lying.

He gives me a withering look that says he doesn’t believe me at all and my heart is pounding in my chest.

“Twenty?”

 _Abort, abort, abort_ , my brain is saying.

 _Do I_ actually _look like I’m twelve?_ I think to myself.

He’s still stuck there, and nothing is happening.

Fine, maybe I’m _not_ good at lying.

“Nineteen. Eighteen?”

“What is this, a rocket countdown?” he says.

“Eighteen, eighteen,” I say, panicking, “I promise, I just turned eighteen today, I can’t take it anymore; your eyes are soulless bottomless pits that are sucking me in and it’s killing me!”

And then he’s gone; pulled away entirely, and he’s kneeling at the foot of the bed, scrubbing his hands through his hair and muttering curse words and I’m left there panting, not quite sure what’s happening anymore.

_Is he going to toss me out?_

I hope not. That would be beyond awkward.

He does not toss me out, which I am very grateful for, but he refuses to come within even a foot of me until I locate my pants and show him my actual ID, which proclaims me Ming Mei Sommers, high-schooler extraordinaire, and both of our boners are flagging and he’s squinting at the little rectangle of plastic like he’s not quite sure that he believes that’s real, either.

This is the most surreal situation I’ve ever been in: naked with another dude in his room in his apartment while he’s glaring at my ID like a police officer and sex might not even be on the menu anymore.

He swings his head to me, dog-like. Eyes narrowed.

“Please don’t hate me,” I squeak, because that look is a little bit terrifying.

“I don’t hate you,” he mutters, tossing my driver’s license on top of the bedside table.

“Okay. Are you going to throw me out?”

He glares a little bit. “You didn’t think it was a good idea to tell me you were eighteen _before_ we started?”

“I thought you were on board! You said I look like I’m sixteen! I’ll have you know I am a _man_ , and I have chest hairs. —Used to.”

We both look at my very hairless chest.

Goddamn Collie and her waxing.

“Also,” I say, “Why were you even down to have sex with a sixteen-year-old! Not that I’m sixteen, which you should know, because you just stared at my license for about half an hour.”

“I didn’t think you were sixteen,” he sulks, and I think my mouth drops open, because is he _pouting_? “I’m robbing the cradle,” he mutters. “You’re jailbait. Is this even legal?”

“Of course it is,” I say, “I’m not _stupid_ , I paid attention in health class! You can have sex with whoever you want when you turn eighteen—”

“Oh my god, of course you’re still in high school,” he moans, covering his face with his hands.

“I _told_ you it was my birthday today!”

“You could’ve skipped a grade!”

“That’s not the point!”

“What _is_ the point?” We’ve both lost track of the conversation, now, and we’re eyeing each other warily.

“You’re still naked,” I point out eventually because my mouth doesn’t have a filter, and because he is.

“You are too,” he says.

He’s sitting on the edge of the bed, drawing a knee up to his chest like he needs to classily hide his dong while a photographer takes candid shots for the cover of _GT_ because unlike the rest of the models, he’s not allowed to have underwear. It’s really cute, and really unfair.

“Can we get the sexy back on?” I ask.

He groans. Scrubs a hand over his face. “I don’t know if I can get it up if you keep talking like that.”

“I’m a little insulted,” I say. “What’s wrong with the way I talk?”

“I… You…” He sighs.

Grinds the heels of his palms into his eyes.

“Come here.”

I go, because he looks like a god and I like him and I want to do everything he says. He wraps a hand around the back of my neck and pulls me close, and then when he kisses me again, it’s gentler: coaxing, and I all but climb into his lap and loop my arms behind his head like I’m some girl about to be ravished.

“Just because we’re going all slow and sweet now doesn’t mean you get to rescind your promise about fucking me into the mattress,” I mutter into his mouth, and he chokes on a laugh.

“Jesus Christ,” he says, “is _anything_ about you subtle?”

“No,” I gasp. He twists us around. I fall back on the bed and his mouth is on my stomach, and for a moment I think he’s going to give me a raspberry and I’m prepared to knee him in the face because I’m horribly ticklish, but he just kisses his way down to the top of my legs (forgoing my dick entirely, which is now perking back up and wondering what the whole problem was in the first place). His mouth is on the inside of my thigh, and then he’s biting down and sucking, and I’m crying out at the pleasure-pain and weaving his hair through my fingers, not knowing if I’m urging him on or trying to pry him off.

Oh god, there’s going to be millions of hickeys tomorrow, thank god it’s the middle of March so Collie won’t do something stupid like try to make me wear bootie shorts or something.

“Please please please please please,” makes it out of my mouth, and I’d be more embarrassed if I weren’t losing my damn _mind_ , honestly, can’t he just stick it in already?

He makes this little growly noise that sends fire licking through my veins, because it’s deliciously dangerous and sexy at the same time, and my libido decides that noise during sex is great.

Sure.

Why not.

We’re not at my house.

We’re _definitely_ not at my house, because there is just us in this apartment, no parents one wall away, and I must be making up for like four years of silent masturbation because this is the loudest I’ve ever been before and I don’t even have it in me to be ashamed. I’d thought I’d be as silent at sex with a partner as I’d been with just my hand cranking on my dick, but apparently not.

It’s fine, though, because one of my legs is finally over his shoulder and the other is sprawled bonelessly sideways because I’m flexible that way and his hands are on either side of my head, and he’s pushing forward. And it hurts; it hurts a lot; it’s the worst pain I’ve ever felt in my life, and I can’t help but to cry out.

“Lucky,” he groans, shifting over me. Tears are pricking my eyes, and he kisses me on the lips, then at the corner of my mouth, then my eyelids and my cheeks and my forehead while I whimper, digging my nails into his triceps and willing the pain to go away. He’s panting, like staying so still for such a long time is an effort, but he’s not moving, and I have to give him credit for that while everything slowly stretches out and eases into a dull ache and I try to convince my brain, _No, I’m not dying_.

“Lucky,” he says again, and he puts his weight all on one elbow so his other hand is pressing into my abdomen, and I vaguely wonder if his cock is poking out to make a bulge in my stomach because it damn sure feels like it. He noses into my neck, nipping at the skin there, and I find myself clutching a little less hard at his arms. I turn my head and he catches my lips. His mouth is warm and soft and one my new favorite things, and distracting enough.

“Can I—Please,” he says, sounding just as broken as I feel. I’m whimpering against his collarbone. He drags his fingers along the skin of my neck, and my neck has always been sensitive, and a bout of full-body shivers rushes through my body like the five-fifteen train.

He shifts and I gasp.

“You’re so tight,” he says into my skin, teeth gritted.

“I’m… normal,” I manage. “You’re just… fucking enormous.”

He pulls out a little bit. It doesn’t feel quite so horrible, but there’s still pain with the drag of his cock, and I can feel every single ridge.

“Are you good?”

A breathless laugh bursts out of me. “I feel… like I sat on a… baseball bat.” I feel his grin against the side of my face. I turn my face, and I catch a glimpse of the most beautiful smile I’ve ever seen, a perfect crescent, and then our lips are pressed together and he’s moving experimentally, little thrusts that are making little pitched whimpers come out of my mouth.

The pain doesn’t go away entirely, when he starts to move for real, but it’s joined by something else; this pleasant spread of warmth in my middle, that turns into sparks and mixes with the burn and stretch. Soon enough, I’m clutching at his arms and digging my teeth into his nipple as I try and shut up and he’s making stifled groans in my ear. He goes from his hands to his elbows and kisses me before relocating his mouth to my neck, sucking another hickey into my skin—then another, and another—while I urge him on breathlessly, because something about his angle has changed and sparks are gathering under my skin and pleasure is running through my veins in a way I haven’t felt before.

Pleasure and pain, when his nails rake down my chest, catching my nipple, and his mouth is back on my neck.

Something I hadn’t really thought about before, but they somehow go together, like sea salt on caramel.

Huh.

It takes me an embarrassingly short amount of time to come with a rather pitched cry I will deny making until my dying day, but he’s not faring much better, his hips stuttering until his teeth clamp down on the juncture between my neck and shoulder and he shoves in so hard that I sob out a little, way too oversensitive but not wanting to whine at him to get out because he needs to finish too, obviously, he deserves it, he’s just fucked me into oblivion.

Or at least into next week.

Anyway, he’s still then, which is great, because my muscles feel like tenderized chicken breast and I am not going to be moving anywhere anytime soon. He’s breathing hard, and probably not doing too great either in the muscle department, because he just kind of collapses on top of me like he’s dead, like I boned him to death, and he’s heavy enough to drive the breath from my lungs, but in a nice way.

Yeah.

It’s great.

Just believe me.

Try it someday if you don’t.

“Pretty sure that was the best orgasm of my life,” I manage. The ceiling is a little bit blurry.

He snorts into my ear.

It’s gross.

It’s awesome.

I can still feel his dick in me, and I know it’s going to be a bitch when he pulls out. Right now, though, I’m content to sit here and catch my breath, because apparently I turn into a whore when I get a good fucking and am unable to keep my mouth shut. Also, I like him draped all over me. He feels like one of those weighted blankets that I’ve always wanted by never gotten because I don’t _need_ one.

He brings his hand up and traces the skin behind my ear lazily, making me sigh happily. I turn my head sideways and kiss his fingertips.

He makes a surprised noise in the back of his throat that is absolutely adorable. I do it again. His thumb is pressing at my lips, and because I have no self-consciousness, I part my lips and suck on it.

Cue another strangled noise that wouldn’t sound out-of-place coming from a dying gazelle. I twist my tongue around the pad of his finger. It tastes like salt and skin. He crooks his thumb a little, dragging it against my teeth as he removes it from my mouth.

I complain, turning to look at him. His head is turned to the side, watching me, and his eyes are blown out still, like shining obsidian.

“Aren’t you supposed to fall asleep after coming?” he asks. “Especially if it was the best orgasm of your life?”

“I drank, like, five cups of coffee with dinner,” I tell him. My blood is still thrumming in my veins. “Also, I’m eighteen and have a really good recovery rate. Don’t complain at _me_ that you’re old and gray.”

“Old and gray?” he says, offended. “Excuse _you_.”

“Yeah, what are you, eighty?”

He bares his teeth in a sarcastic smile and hoists himself up to his elbows. “Are you always so rude?” he asks, looking down at me.

“Do you have a problem with my mouth?”

His eyes narrow just a little bit, dangerously sexy, and he slaps his hand around my neck. I squeak and shut up. He’s not strangling me or anything—his hand is just _there_ , and it feels really nice, like he _might_ tighten his grip a little, and I honestly don’t really think I’d have a problem with that. His thumb, still a little damp from my mouth, is scraping against my pulse.

His eyes are predatory, sweeping me up and down, and there’s this little smirk playing across his lips. “You look good like this,” he says. I want to snark back that I always look good, but he tightens his hand—a little, just a little, and my mouth snaps shut of its own accord, my teeth clicking. I’m sure he can feel my racing heartbeat under his fingertips, and even though I came like, five minutes ago, my brain is telling my dick that it’s time to go again.

He grins once, something salacious that turns playful at the end, but turns away before I see any more. He pulls out and I spasm, whimpering involuntarily. Rolls off me.

“Where are you going?” I say, because fuck, he’s warm, and his skin is peeling off me and now I’m shivering at the loss.

He looks at my sticky chest, and I don’t know why I’m blushing; I’m eighteen, I’m allowed to be exuberant. “To get a towel,” he says.

I get a really good view of his ass as he walks away, and… _damn_. It’s so bitable.

I force myself to roll out of the bed, and follow him through the immaculate white door to the connected bathroom. After all, I’ve never been one to waste an opportunity.

* * *

I don’t actually go to school the next day.

My pants are somewhere in his apartment, though I have no idea where. After I followed him into the bathroom, we tried to clean up and then he let _me_ fuck _him_ in the shower and then an hour later we jacked each other off while he whispered filthy things in my ear and I latched onto his shoulder with my teeth and it wasn’t until the next morning, after I’d overslept my alarm by four hours because I didn’t hear it and snoozed _his_ alarm an inordinate amount of times before finally getting pissed and unplugging his clock while still half-asleep because it kept waking me up and then _actually_ waking up when the sun decided it was a great idea to shine straight into my eyes and make me go blind before I realized that I was in a stranger’s house with said stranger using my stomach as a pillow, that I manage to extricate myself from his clutches and stumble into the bathroom, trying to scrub morning crustiness from my eyes, and look in the mirror to see that it looks like a dog has been chewing on my neck with the number of bruises there and _fuck_ , I don’t really own anything with a high collar.

But then it doesn’t matter because Michael slinks in, his voice an octave and a half deeper from sleep, looking just as mauled as me, and wants to fuck me over the edge of the bathtub until I point out that I’m too sore, so he sucks my dick instead. I’m fairly sure the man’s mouth was created by the devil himself because he can do things with his tongue that should be illegal, and I come with a strangled noise and the surety that I’ve just seen Jesus even though I’m lazily agnostic at best. I return the favor next to the toilet and when I swallow instead of spitting he tells me that doesn’t count as my breakfast and I snark at him, _Yes, Daddy_ , and that just gets us started all over again.

By noon, he’s called in sick to work and Bryce has left him a loud, complaining voicemail ( _Don’t think I don’t know what you’re doing! You’re fucking that damn kid from the club, I’m not an idiot, I swear to god, Michael, you better kick him out before your neighbors complain that you two sound like fornicating yaks and you end up getting evicted for noise disturbance because I’m not going to let you crash at_ my _place anymore, god knows, you always fucking rearrange everything_ _so that I can’t find it_ ) and I’m plastered on top of him, nuzzling his neck as he lies on the couch flipping mindlessly between TV channels while I try to think about what lie I’m going to tell my parents (and how much of the truth I’m going to tell Collie), though his hands keep slipping into my hair and under the too-large pants he’s letting me borrow and kneading my ass and he keeps grinding his dick into me and it’s ridiculously distracting so I just give up and suck on his tongue and tell myself I’ll wing it.

I have his number by late afternoon, though he practically kicks me out of his Prius in the Target parking lot near where Collie and I live and tells me not to come back for three days at least because it feels like someone’s jacked him off with sandpaper.

Despite that, I text him at eleven at night when I’m lying in bed, giddy with _something_ , I don’t know what, and get a reply almost immediately, and if it devolves into sexting from there, it honestly isn’t _my_ fault: I’m eighteen and really horny, okay? Hormones! We don’t send each other pictures of our man bits, I _swear_.

The next day, Collie is hounding me for details until I practically have to unwrap her from my chest after school so she can get to theater rehearsal. When I get home, I lie to my parents that I need to meet with a friend after school for homework—which they only agree to because Collie covers for me and says that after our sleepover the night before I got food poisoning, so I slept it off at her place—though it technically it’s only a half-lie, because he _is_ a friend: we’re just definitely not working on that English project.

Well.

The rest, from there, is history.

Isn’t that what the kids say these days?


	2. Everyone Knows I Hate Waking Up Before Noon, Yet I Am Still Invited to Brunch

_**Five years later** _

I hate mornings.

They are the worst part of my day.

As a result, I choose to ignore them. I also save money that way: do you know that if you sleep in late enough, you don’t have to eat breakfast?

Life hack.

Unless, of course, your best friend (Collie) just comes back from shadowing an international teacher in Kazakhstan and another one of your friends (Jason number one) decides that L.A. is great, but an law firm back _here_ just offered him a job with way higher pay than California had ever thought about and your other friend (Ella) breaks up with her boyfriend in Australia and moves back to her parents’ place while she looks for a new place and your other friend (Queenie) completes her PhD at Oxford and comes back to teach at the U of M and another friend (Jason number two, but whom everyone calls Jackie because his last name is Chan) decides Florida is just too damn hot and crazy and also at risk of submergence due to global warming so he’s transferring back here to finish his Master’s and your shitstick of a friend (Bryce) gets back from a month-long work trip in Canada where he’s been frolicking with chiseled twinks and muscle daddies for some gay magazine’s photo shoot and decides to invite you to brunch—since it’s the first time in years that everyone’s been all together in the same place at the same time—at Queenie’s parents’ house, at ten-thirty in the morning on Sunday, an ungodly time when nobody should be awake, or possibly even alive. It is at this point that you will find yourself spending all the money that you saved by not eating breakfast on whatever glittery, fancy things you need to take to the hosts’ house to immediately enamor yourself to them, because even though you’ve been a part of this friend group for five years, you have somehow never met Queenie’s parents.

Which is why I find myself at a flower store at the ass crack of dawn right when they open, before literally _any_ other customer, brooding over flowers while I try not to look like a guilty man who’s just punched a girl in the boob and needs to buy two dozen roses to make it up for her.

Roses are ridiculously expensive, and the only other bouquets here are lilies mixed with chrysanthemums and baby’s breath, and _those_ flowers remind me of all sorts of crap so I just buy roses. Then I figure since that we’re all adults, people will probably appreciate wine more than chocolates, so I make a detour to Cub Foods' liquor section, where I get carded, because I somehow still look like I’m twelve even though my twenty-third birthday is coming up in just a little more than a month.

Then, of course, I remember that I haven’t seen ninety percent of my friends in person for the past two and a half years or so, so I figure that I should get _them_ something too, and I end up having to run through a two different antiques stores, a craft shop, a Target, and a Barnes & Noble to find something for each of them.

Since it’s only ten nineteen after that, and I know that nobody has ever showed up to brunch on-time except Queenie (at least, not when we used to have one every week back in the deep dark past), I decide to treat myself and stop at Starbucks, and I almost fall asleep waiting for my coffee to cool down—at least until a woman comes in with her kid, who asks why there’s a “dead teenager” at one of the tables, which I take as my cue to leave, because now I’m also late. The coffee still ends up burning my tongue because I try to finish it as fast as humanely possible so I don’t have to take the cup into my car, because I don’t drink and drive.

I have to use my phone’s GPS to find Queenie’s parents’ place, because they live in an unfamiliar part of the suburbs a little past downtown, where the streets are still like mazes but the smell of gasoline isn’t quite so prevalent and construction hasn’t yet seized control of the sidewalks. They have a nice place: a small house with an adobe-brick façade, white shutters, and a bay window with the ugliest poodle I have every laid eyes on lounging in front of the backdrop of the mostly-closed blinds. The driveway is already crammed with cars (four, so unless people drove together, at least I’m not the last to arrive, thank goodness), so I’m forced to park on the street in front of their neighbors, under a pine tree that looks like it’s about to topple over from the amount of snow piled on its thick branches, which only makes me worry a _little_ about the future of the old Corolla Dad and I share.

I get everything out of the backseat, and then my shoes get soaked when I traipse through the unplowed street (because cities don’t have money for anything anymore) to the shoveled driveway. I just hope that I’m here long enough for my shoes to dry before I have to get back in them, and that the water doesn’t seep through to my socks in the thirty seconds it’s taking me to get to the front door.

I ring the doorbell. My breath puffs out in little clouds of white. I look around. It snowed last night, so everything is pristine and glittering. Christmas and New Year’s had passed, rather uneventfully, a month before, and I honestly couldn’t remember much of either because I had spent both getting drunk off my ass so that my brain would shut up for three seconds. Of course, then my father had rung me the day after because I'd only picked up one (1) of Bryce’s “very urgent” calls over a span of two weeks and told at me that I’d better get my act together before I ended up going to the hospital with a blood-alcohol content of point-four percent. I snapped at him that he should mind his own business and he snapped right back at me that I _was_ his business, and would always be his business, until I died; and then I drove over to his place and we made sugar cookies and marathoned bootlegged musicals; I bawled my eyes out while he petted my hair, looking sad. He’d probably been wishing that he’d chosen that other baby he and Mom were going to adopt before they saw me, so small and tiny and nameless and homeless, at the adoption center, and changed their minds. I should’ve come with a warning sign: _This child is defective_.

Anyway, so I moved back in with him so he could “keep an eye on me” but we both pretended it was so I could “keep an eye on him” since he was, technically, getting on in the years, and nearly all of the brown in his hair had been replaced with gray and white and he’d fallen down the stairs last September, breaking his hip.

That’s all that’s really happened since; I don’t know if it bodes well or not for the coming year.

Probably not.

Another car pulls up in front of the house before the door is answered.

Bryce’s silver Camry.

“Dear Lord!” he shouts, unrolling the passenger side window. “You really went all-out, didn’t you?”

I shoot him the finger.

A grin spreads across his snow-white face. His teeth sparkle like ice. “Missed you too!”

The front door opens before I can shoot back a cocky reply and I’m greeted by an aging man, maybe in his fifties or sixties, who could be no other than Queenie’s father, because he’s got her eyes and her chin.

“Hello,” I say.

“Ah, _ni hao_ , _ni hao_. Come on in,” he says, accent thick, pulling the door open all the way and getting out of the way. He smiles softly.“Which one of the friends are you?”

“ _Hold the door_!” I hear Bryce yell from behind me, and the crunch of his footsteps as he runs straight across the yard in knee-deep snow.

“I’m Lucky,” I say, because I can’t say, _I’m the short, gay, overemotional one_. There’s a haphazard pile of footwear on the towel laid down on the kitchen linoleum; gray water has already started seeping into it as it leaches out of the shoes.

“Ah, Lucky.” He nods sagely. “Good name. Nice to meet you.”

Someone skids into the kitchen on slippery socks; or maybe the slippery floor, because I can smell—and hear—shrimp crackers being fried, and I can see the oil droplets hanging thick in the air and making the kitchen hazy and blurry at the edges.

I guess I should point out that brunch is a pretty loose term for what happens. Usually when people hear “brunch” they think very American or European things, like omelets, French toast, bacon, and mimosas at ten in the morning with everyone gone by noon, and I only adopted the term for whatever _this_ is because my mom called it a brunch _once_ and the word never got out of my head after that despite my best efforts to punt it out my ear. What we _actually_ do is get together, everyone arriving from between ten-thirty to eleven (despite Queenie’s best efforts to collar us and have everyone be punctual) at the place of whoever’s turn it is to host the meal (we trade off). Sometimes people bring a food offering from home (or the store) but regardless, we raid the pantry and slap together three to four dishes before sitting down and eating and talking until at least three in the afternoon. The last person usually doesn’t leave until five (unless the host has Very Urgent Business and kicks us all out) and sometimes if we’re all still there by seven we figure, Fuck it, and go out for dinner together, too.

These meetings are the only reason I learned how to cook (and thus survive through college), and being able to know how to make fried rice and _char kway teow_ and roast duck helped quiet my brain a tiny amount on the whole _You’re a fake Asian!_ thing.

“Who’s here?” Queenie demands, and I immediately take a step back, contemplating fleeing, because I am technically late, and I know she’s going to say something and absolutely no one is immune to her guilt trips, not even Ella, who is so fierce that she should be a lesbian but she isn’t. Bryce, unfortunately, has come up behind me, stomping the snow off of his jeans and yanking off his hat, cutting off my escape route.

Queenie’s dad swears loudly in Chinese and runs for the frying shrimp crackers before I can hand him the roses and wine; the smell of burning begins to decorate the air.

She sees us.

She stabs a finger at me and Bryce.

“Fuck,” Bryce says. “We should run—”

“You,” Queenie growls, her eyes crackling with what looks like death light.

“Me?” I squeak.

Bryce is cowering behind me and I think he mutters something like “What color do you want me to wear at your funeral?” and then Queenie is advancing on me. She’s as tall as Bryce, which is _unfair_ , and which also means she towers over all of us when she wears heels, but it’s okay because she enjoys the attention.

I prepare myself for the worst.

I’m cringing backwards a little as she gets closer, but then she opens her arms wide and yanks me forward so hard that I stumble, hugging me tight to her chest until I grunt. “It’s been ages, you idiot. I didn’t know you were coming.”

“I invited him,” Bryce grumbles, always one to swoop in and take credit.

“You did?” she says, sounding genuinely surprised for a moment, but she recovers quickly. “Oh good. The whole gang will be here, then. Bryce, you can go downstairs and find a new can of oyster sauce from the pantry, because we ran out five minutes ago. Wait. Not that you’d know that, because you’re _late_!”

“Jesus,” Bryce mutters, kicking his shoes onto the growing pile and hanging up his coat. “You’d think I killed your dog or something.”

“What was that?” Queenie asks sweetly.

“Nothing.” Bryce slinks past me, making for the stairs to the basement. “Do we need anything else?”

“I’m sure we’ll think of things as they come up,” Queenie replies, which is her code for, _We’ll probably be sending you up and down the stairs at least fifty more times before we start eating to get totally unnecessary ingredients that we absolutely don’t need but that’s what you get for getting here at_ ten fifty-six. Actually, it makes me wonder why more people aren’t in the kitchen. Usually, there’s at least four (if not more) people in here, yelling about how much soy sauce should _actually_ go in the wonton filling and the correct number of minutes for steaming mustard greens and the _right_ way to pinch a dumpling shut, because apparently everybody’s grandmothers had completely different ways of doing it. Since it’s her parents’ place, though, maybe the food’s already made.

Queenie looks back at me, and I’m still not completely convinced that I’ve managed to escape her wrath. “I’ve missed you,” she says.

“I’ve missed you too,” I say, because I have, and I can’t keep a smile from tilting my mouth up. “I brought…” I hold out the bag with everyone’s stuff as explanation. “There’s something for you in there. I think it might be towards the bottom.”

“Oh my god, Lucky, you didn’t need to do that!”

“I did anyway,” I say as she takes possession of the bag and riffles through its contents until she reaches the enormous tome I’ve gotten her.

“Oh my god,” she says. “ _No_. Lucky, you shouldn’t have.”

I grin because she looks so happy; she’s setting the bag on the floor and crouching down, the book already balanced on her knees as she flips reverently through the thin pages of tiny text paying homage to Melinno, Sulpicia, and Faltonia Betita Proba, among others. The next thing I know, she’s wrapped around me again, squeezing me so forcefully that I almost can’t breathe.

“You’re the best,” she mutters fiercely.

“Thanks,” I somehow manage.

She steps back, clutching the book loosely, and looks me up and down again. “Nice… flowers.”

“Thanks, they’re for—”

“Who’s here?” Collie’s head peeks around the corner.

“Collie!”

“Oh my god!” She runs for me, and both of us crash into the door, sending it slamming back against the wall, but it’s okay because I’m laughing and she’s laughing and my best friend is here again, with me.

“I can’t find it!” Bryce hollers from the pantry and Queenie disappears knowingly into the basement, most likely to show him where it is right in front of his face, because he’s terrible at finding things, and also berate him some more.

I bury my face in Collie’s shoulder. It’s been almost a year since I’ve seen her; though we text and call, it’s not the same.

She smells like mint, and is tanner than I remember.

“Shit, Lucky,” she says.

“Hey.”

“It’s been forever.”

“Yeah.” I tell myself that those aren’t tears pricking my eyes. It’s just condensation, because the storm door is a little bit broken and hangs off the hinges a little and the cold air is seeping inside and mixing with my body heat.

We hold each other, like that, for a long time.

Finally, she lets go, so I let go, and she leans back to look at me. “What happened?” she asks.

“I don’t know what you mean.”

“You look older.”

I snort. “Don’t tell me that. I just got carded at Cub. A guy was feeling good about himself.”

Her eyes slip slyly down to the wine and flowers, which I am surprised to see haven’t been crushed by Queenie. “I see.” She adds a moment later, “Though that’s not what I meant.”

“No?”

She shakes her head. “I didn’t think you’d be here.”

I look at her curiously. “What do you mean?”

“I invited him!” comes Bryce’s indignant voice from the pantry, because he has ears like a mouse.

We look at each other, and our mouths twitch. A moment later, we’ve burst out laughing. She presses her hand to her mouth, but I can see the corners of her lips curving up still. “He’s still the same, isn’t he?”

“I’m sure Toronto had absolutely zero effect on him.” I can’t help my grin.

“I heard that!” Bryce hollers. He can be louder than a tornado siren when he wants to be. “And I’ll tell you that Toronto was absolutely amazing for my libi—”

I assume that Queenie slaps a hand over his mouth, because he’s cut off mid-word, which I’m thankful for: I want to know exactly zero new things about Bryce’s sex life, because I already know too much.

“Come on in already,” Collie says, “I see Jackie and Jason pulling up, let’s not block the way in.”

So I add my shoes to the pile, homage of me being here. The toes of my socks are wet.

“How have you been?” I ask her. “How was Kazakhstan?”

“Enlightening.” Her eyes brighten. “The kids there are wonderful; I’m thinking about going back after I get my teaching license.”

I don’t tell her about the tinge of sadness that runs through me at that. _We’re not high schoolers anymore!_ I berate myself. _We don’t need to cling to each other._

I’ll just miss her, is all.

Then the Jasons yank open the storm door, interrupting whatever might’ve crawled out of my mouth and embarrassed me, and the two of them bundle inside, because they’re both stupid and neither of them are wearing coats over their short sleeves. They stomp the snow off their shoes and complain about the cold and traffic and why the hell isn’t the road plowed?

Collie snorts. “There’s always shovels in the garage,” she says, “I’m sure you can go shovel it yourself if you want.”

“Have you _seen_ his udon arms?” Jackie snickers, pinching the skin on Jason’s bicep.

Jason punches him on the shoulder.

“Didn’t even hurt, man.” He looks at Collie, and I catch the way his eyes linger. “Colleen. Looking wonderful, as usual.”

“Of course,” Collie says breezily, playing it off. “And you look absolutely stupid, wearing a tank top in February.”

Jason snorts; looks at his friend. “She has you there.”

Their eyes fall on me, together. “Lucky,” Jackie says, pulling me into an abrupt hug, and I’m glad I have sleeves so I don’t have to feel his cold skin directly on mine. “How are you doing?”

Jason grins, and one of his eyebrows twitches up at the contents of my hands, which had been forgotten until now, because I’d been distracted. “Wonderful to see you again,” he says. Hesitates. “I didn’t know you’d be coming.” He adds, hastily, before I can squint at him, “But I’m glad you’re here nonetheless.”

“Oh, well, Bryce invited me,” I say, before Bryce can break his neck by vaulting up the stairs and announcing to the world that he’s the whole reason I’m here and thus should be announced as our Lord and Savior, Jesus Bryce. Wave toward the bag. “I got you guys something.”

“ _Really_?” Jackie says, lunging forward.

“Yours is the toilet paper,” I tell him, “because so much shit comes out of your mouth.”

“Ha, ha,” he says, but he’s already grinning, tossing the boxed LEGO set of the Louvre back and forth between his hands. “Thanks, man. You’re awesome.”

“Yeah, of course.”

Jason finds his wrapped cloisonné vase with a small, pleased smile that he tries to hide. He catches my eye. “Thanks.”

“No problem.”

“I can pay you back.”

“Oh my god, just take it, you insufferable Asian, it’s a _gift_.”

Collie is eyeing the bag now, trying to disguise how much she likes presents. “Is there something for me in there?”

“No, Collie, I got everyone something except you.” I roll my eyes, and she takes that as invitation to descend upon her prey.

“Oh!” she exclaims.

“Where’s Bryce?” Jason asks curiously. “His car’s on the side of the road.”

I point to the basement and, just on cue, “…clean the toilet…” floats up from downstairs—Queenie’s voice. Jackie and Jason immediately pale.

“We should probably get out of here before she comes upstairs,” Jason says hastily, clearing his throat.

“Yeah. If anyone asks, we were here the whole time.” Jackie shoots me a salute and a wink, and after one last look at Collie, he disappears after Jason around the kitchen corner, to the rest of the house.

Collie is shredding open the thin plastic wrap over her scrapbook, now, and I can tell she likes it, because she’s touching the embossed cover gently, like it might warp under her fingers.

Eventually, she looks up. “Thanks, Lucky.”

“Yeah, of course. I figured you might want to keep track of your adventures in all those exotic places you’ve been going to.”

Her mouth spreads into a smile.

“So…” I say and I have to grin, I can’t keep it off my face, because she shoots a look to the kitchen corner like she knows where the Jasons have gone.

“What?” Collie asks raising an eyebrow. Queenie’s dad dumps a few more shrimp crackers into the wok; the sound of bubbling oil fills the air.

It sounds like home.

I raise an eyebrow, because I know she’s smart enough to know what I’m talking about.

“Don’t you look at me like that, Lucky Sommers.”

“Come on.”

Her lips press together, but she has the same oversharing issue that I have and it’s only three seconds before she’s going, “Okay, you can’t judge me, okay, it was _one night_ and it means absolutely nothing, okay? We’re one hundred percent _just friends_ and we haven’t seen each other since. Okay? Nothing’s happening; I’ve been back for like three weeks, okay, and he got back two weeks ago, and he’s in the apartment complex only three streets over, so it’s not a big deal if we run into each other once in a while and you know what? I’m allowed to have some fun, because I’ve been working myself to the bone for the past year and a half and _I deserve it_.” She glares at me at that last bit, and I raise myself defensively, almost taking my eye out with the roses.

“I never said you didn’t.”

She slumps a little bit, tirade over. She’s always been fiercer than me. “I know. Sorry. I just…” she shoots a very, very quick look toward where I’m assuming the kitchen connects to the living room, past the corner.

I don’t tell her I see it.

“I get it,” I say quietly. Because I do. I know the feeling of working your ass off, and wanting a reward. To be able to give yourself something special.

She shrugs. “It’s nothing.”

I wander a little farther into the house, wanting to hug her again because it really has been so long. “I mean, three blocks away is pretty close,” I say. “You might just find yourself over there one day. For no reason.”

She grabs my scarf and yanks me to her, wrapping her arms around my middle. “You little shit,” she says into my hair.

“Thanks,” I tell her, but I’m smiling, because it’s just like how it used to be. Lucky and Collie, against the world.

Besides, I can see it happening. Jackie’s a good guy; he’s fond of jokes and dispensing terrible advice, and even though he flirts with everything with a pulse, he seems like one of those people who’s really searching for a soul mate at heart. I tell this to Collie.

“Maybe I just want a fuck-buddy,” she says.

I snort. “Well, you know, he’s probably down for that, too.” I’m pretty sure Jackie fucks as much as he breathes.

She chuckles.

I’m about to open my mouth and tell her, Seriously, she should go for it if she’s interested, because that gleam in Jackie’s eye would have definitely morphed into a Yes if she’d asked, but then Ella rounds the counter, a cranky black-haired raven like she’s always been.

“Who’s here?” she snaps. “Jason and Jackie are fighting over sitting in front of the heater vent in the hallway and they won’t tell me.” She sees me and her eyes go huge, and she’s not a raven anymore, she’s more like a little chickadee.

“Lucky,” she says.

Collie lets go so that Ella can take possession of me, and she hugs me so tightly I think my back cracks. Seriously, why go to a chiropractor when you have an Ella? She’s shorter than me—the only one of our group who is, at four-foot-eleven—which is nice, so I can bury my nose in her hair.

Collie shoos us away from the front of the stove, so I take a couple steps back, hauling Ella with me.

“It’s been ages, you ass crack,” Ella says, slapping my back with more strength than I would’ve thought possible, what with her tiny frame.

“I could say the same,” I laugh. “How was Australia?”

I can feel her scowl through my shirt. “Filled with lying, cheating scumbags,” she says, and that makes a little curl of darkness wrap around my throat.

“Sorry about that,” I force out.

“It’s not your fault,” she says. She pulls away, hands on my shoulders, and swipes a look up and down me. I have the sudden urge to straighten my sports jacket, even though it’s not crooked. “Hm. I didn’t know you were coming.”

“I invited him,” Bryce says from the top of the stairs, annoyed that everyone seems to keep saying this.

“Oh, shut up,” Queenie says, on his heels.

He scowls at her.

“Well, I’m here.” I flash a smile. “I brought you something.”

Her eyes widen a little in pleased surprise. “You—”

“Catch.” She turns in time for Collie to toss her several packets off toffee, which she adores but constantly complains that she can’t find in any supermarket.

“Fuck yeah,” she says, eyeing the clear plastic packaging. She grins at me. “You sure know a way to a girl’s heart, Lucky Sommers.”

“What a pity I’m not straight,” I say. “We could share so many escapades.”

She snickers. Looks at the flowers in my hands. Her eyebrows arch high on her forehead.

“They’re for—”

Queenie hollers, interrupting me, as the poodle that had previously been on the window gets into the kitchen and lunges for the open bag of shrimp crackers. “Max! No!” The poodle acquires its prize. “God damn it, I thought—”

The race is on as the poodle darts through my legs, downstairs, and Queenie sprints after it.

“Ah.” Ella glances to the living room again.

“What’s going on?” I ask. My brain is starting to pick up some pieces, and I’m curious—everyone’s seemed surprised that I would be here. Am I not supposed to be here?

“Nothing,” she says, and I look at her suspiciously.

“Everyone’s said they weren’t expecting me,” I tell her.

“Literally,” Bryce mutters, going for the bag when Collie nudges it toward him with a foot. He shoots a glance at me and I give him a little _Go ahead_ nod.

“Fuck yeah,” he mutters. “ _Borderlands 3_? You’re the best.”

I snort. I don’t quite think buying him a video game makes me the greatest person to live, no matter how much he’d been drooling over it.

He tucks the game into his pants and swipes me into a hug, smacking me on the back so hard it drives the breath from my body.

“Ugh, get off me you, you brute.” I elbow him in the stomach and snickers and lets go of me, stealing a shrimp cracker from the ever-growing pile on the stove and taking over the frying as Queenie’s dad says he’s goes to fetch his spouse. “Who else is here?”

Ella opens her mouth, but Queenie’s voice cuts her off. “Ella! Help me with this devil dog!” She looks like she wants to stay, but when you’re summoned by a queen, you always obey orders, and she disappears down the stairs.

Bryce just looks very relieved that it isn’t him.

“You’re all acting really suspicious,” I say, starting to make for the living room.

Collie grabs my arm. “Lucky,” she says.

“What?”

“I…” she trails off, hesitant for the first time in her life. “Do you actually not know?”

“I literally have no idea what you’re talking about,” I say, bemused.

She looks at the roses. “I thought…” she shakes her head. “You should stay in here, then. Or go help Queenie.”

“What?”

Her grip tightens. “I thought you knew. I thought that was why you came.”

A chuckle leaks out. “What are you talking about? Is it a surprise?” I have a love-hate relationship with surprises, because you never know if they’re good or bad until the second you find out.

“No, Lucky, that’s really not a good idea—”

She tries to hold on to me, but I slip out of her grasp because I actually am curious now, and a surprise would explain a lot.

I turn the corner.

There’s a set of double-hinged, white slatted doors between the kitchen and the living room to keep all the kitchen smells in the kitchen, where they belong, and out of the upholstery, where they don’t belong.

Jackie and Jason burst in at almost the same time, trying to scramble in front of each other, and I catch a glimpse of a neat table set up in the dining room and a cozy living room a little past that, behind a beaded curtain hanging from the doorway, before they’re both in my face. “Hey, so—” They see me and freeze. “Uh. Lucky. Hi.”

“Okay,” I laugh nervously, looking between the two of their flustered faces. “You guys are acting _really_ weird.”

Bryce is crunching on another shrimp cracker and somehow manages to bend himself around the corner while still handling the wok full of spitting oil. “What’s going on?”

“That’s what _I_ want to know,” I say, pushing past the two of them.

“No, no, Lucky, wait, did you know?”

“Know what?”

“He didn’t,” Collie says behind me, sounding a little panicked now.

My heart’s beating faster. Somehow I manage to evade six hands and push through the double-hinged doors. I see Queenie’s parents coming down the hallway that connects to the dining room but I bypass them; I’ll be right there in a second, I just want to see what’s going on.

Why they’re all being weird.

In retrospect, I should have known.

I should have seen it coming.

It was awfully clichéd, after all.

I blamed it on my stupid feelings, later. There was this kind of giddy happiness to my stomach, because we were back: the O.G. gang, we were back together, and we were going to make this year one to remember. All my friends were here.

Every single one.

So I don’t really know what else I expected when I pushed through the tan beads and see the tangle of dark hair, under the painting of the rice terraces, and the long legs curled up in a corner of the red sofa.

And I slow, the wooden floorboards creaking beneath my feet.

And I hear Bryce’s death shriek behind me: “You did _what_?!” followed by the scramble of feet trying to prevent the inevitable.

And I see him pull an AirPod out of one of his ears.

And I see him look up from his phone.

And I know the exact moment he sees me, because I know that look on his face, I’ve seen it on my face, and I know that face, because I’ve seen it in my dreams.

And something breaks inside of me and I think I shatter into a thousand pieces.


	3. Obligatory Info Dump and Also Why I Hate My Birthday

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Guys I spent SO LONG formatting on Word to make the texting part look SUPER NICE and it almost looks real! And then I copy-paste and it all goes down the toilet :((( AND THEN I had to go in and write in all the html commands because something got screwy and the entire document ended up as a solid block of text that I Was Not vibing with, and of course this all had to happen on the one chapter I put fifty million "enter"s in; so if anything's wonky, that's why: I've gone blind from typing in a hundred million < p >s. I suppose that's what I get for putting in so much angst, but I'm a slut for clichés.
> 
> Also, I know everyone's saying this, but dear American friends, if you haven't voted already, REMEMBER TO VOTE!!! Happy November~

_What the fuck, Lucky?_ you’re probably thinking. _The last time you and Michael were together, you were all but falling on each others’ cocks. What happened?_

I’ll tell you.

Michael turned out to be a cheating asshole, which is what happens when you date someone six years your senior and why you should keep the age gap to a year or less.

That’s it.

The end of the story.

Move on.

I’ll move on.

That’s what I tell myself.

 _Told_ myself, because I’ve totally, one hundred percent moved on.

Did you know we never moved in together, while we were dating?

Actually, Michael moved out.

To Japan, specifically, because he got a promotion to a better department where the pay was ridiculously high—high enough that even the humblest of people wouldn’t have been able to look at the number without drooling a little.

Looking back on it, the whole thing was pretty hilarious, in a sick, twisted-up kind of way. Because I was so sure.

I was so sure of our love.

I was so sure it was going to work.

We were going to _make_ it work, no matter what.

That’s what we told ourselves and each other, anyway. And that’s why it all fell apart. We don’t tell the stories about perfect people, after all. We tell the stories where people scream and cry and wreck their rooms at two in the morning and then, somehow, pull themselves together, because life will keep going. You’ll want to be left behind, but it doesn’t work like that.

So.

Three years ago. We were still together.

Can you picture it?

Good.

The beginning of the end started like this.

* * *

“Fuck,” Micah says. His living room is a mess of boxes, both big and small. We’re carting it all to storage right before we’re taking him to the airport, because he’s going to be gone for an indeterminate amount of time, and he doesn’t really want to pay rent in two places, even though he has enough money to make it happen.

Besides, he said, he could always crash with friends if he moved back, and it wouldn’t take long to find a new place.

“What?” I ask. I’m poring over a box with just books in it. I don’t know where he hid these books when I came over, but as soon as we started packing his stuff, dozens of them just seemed to appear out of nowhere.

“I can’t find the B.F.F.”

Ah.

The plushie we had, or as we had lovingly dubbed it, the Big Fucking Frog. We’d gone to the fair last August, and one of us (me) had turned out to be far better at ring toss than the other; the B.F.F. was the lingering evidence.

“How do you lose a frog the size of a small mountain?” I scramble to my feet. It was indeed the size of a small mountain—or the size of me, as Micah took all too much glee in pointing out regularly. I would snap back that one day I’d murder him and stuff him in the B.F.F. and where would we be then?—he’d end up on BuzzFeed Unsolved, that’s where—but he’d point out that he was too big to fit inside of its fuzzy polyester skin and so I would grumble and then he would kiss me on the forehead and then one of us would find somewhere new and creative to hide it (which was difficult, because I don’t know if I’ve pointed this out before, but it’s _literally_ _the size of a small mountain_ ) to see how long it would take the other to find it, because that was hilarious.

Much like the ring toss, I was better at the game than he was. One time I snuck into his workplace on Sunday and wedged it into a corner, where it was staring into his office from behind an open slit in his curtains like a peeping Tom for almost two weeks until Bryce finally asked _What the fuck is up with the frog?_ and Micah almost shit himself when he saw it.

 _You should’ve seen the look on his face!_ Bryce howled the next time the eight of us had brunch together and Micah had been all scowly and pretended he was all manly and didn’t like it, but then when we got home he gave me the dicking of my life and told me I’d better watch out because he was going to hide it good next time. (He cleared out the entire fucking freezer to stuff it in there.)

“I thought you found it from last time,” I say, clambering over boxes. A plus of being small; anything can be your throne.

“I did,” he says. “Did you hide it again?”

“No, it’s your turn,” I say.

He casts a frown over the apartment. It looks strangely bare, without the picture frames of us and the neat cabinets and the electric piano just under the window.

Bryce appears in the doorway, his hair tied back into the sloppiest ponytail I’ve ever seen, which is already coming undone to straggle down his neck and against the thin sweater that’s the only thing protecting him from the January wind. (“I’m only outside for thirty seconds at a time,” he’d said, “what’s the point of putting a coat on?”)

“Uh, guys, are you gonna help or are you just gonna stand there mooching all over each other?”

He’s trying to glare, but he’s even softer than Micah is, so it’s not working. The tough-guy act they have only works on people they don’t know, much to both their chagrin.

“We’re not _mooching_ ,” Micah mutters, checking an open box for the B.F.F. before shoving its flaps closed and yanking it up to take to the U-Haul.

His biceps strain at the shirt he has on.

“Ugh,” Bryce says. “Lucky, stop drooling. It’s not an attractive look.”

Micah shoots me a leer that goes straight to my pants. “If you’re having trouble finding things to do—”

“NO!” Bryce hollers and grabs the back of Micah’s neck, hauling him out of the room before he can proposition me and we can get into good-bye sex for the third time today. (What can I say, it’s been a good morning.)

Micah’s laughter trails out from the hallway, and then I hear the _ding_ of the elevator; the rattle of the doors opening and closing.

I grin and let out a little breath, because I’d totally been lying, and I _had_ hidden the B.F.F. again, which I thought was only fair, since he was travelling half the world away and I didn’t know when I’d get to see him next. That way, I’d get to keep him company.

He’d think of me.

It takes us two hours to get everything to the storage center and unloaded, and by the time we’re done, nobody wants to drive the U-Haul back to wherever it came from because we all want to go with him to the airport. So we take the U-Haul _to_ the airport, getting several funny looks, but it’s worth it because we all laugh our guts out.

Time flies quickly when you’re having fun, though, and it’s not long before we’re standing in front of customs while Jackie complains about the price of airport food as he scopes out the nearby Caribou Coffee.

“Oh, shut up,” Micah says, grabbing him in a headlock and scrubbing his knuckles over Jackie’s hair until he’s yelping and trying to get away desperately. Somehow, they manage to control their egos and give each other a short hug.

“I’ll miss you, man,” Jackie says.

They slap each others’ palms.

“You guys are such bros,” Collie says in feigned disgust and Ella cackles, because they’re practically girl best friends.

Micah rolls his eyes. Grabs Collie and yanks her in for a hug.

“Don’t catch herpes in Japan,” she says with a sly look at me, and I give her the finger.

He hugs Ella.

She slaps his back.

He hugs Jason, and Queenie, and Bryce.

“Don’t forget to call,” Bryce says, his eyes suspiciously shiny. All of us are looking away pointedly because the two of them like to remind us that they are Men, capitalized, and _Men_ don’t cry.

Which is a big fat lie because if the sniffles coming from their direction mean anything, I’m pretty sure they’ve both got tears in their eyes.

“I’m going to forget all the time,” Micah says roughly. “You’ll go ages without hearing from me and then you’ll forget about me and then in twenty months you’ll be like, ‘Hey, didn’t I used to know a guy? Name started with ‘M’…’”

Bryce snorts and punches Micah in the stomach. “You’re so full of shit.”

“So are you.”

They grin at each other, sharing some repressed homo memory probably, and then Micah looks at me. “Lucky,” he says.

“Oh, _bleaugh_ ,” Bryce says, elbowing his way violently out of Micah’s arms. “I never want to see that look on your face ever again while you’re holding me.”

Micah grins. “That’s okay,” he says, folding me against his chest. “This is the only person I need.” He tightens his arms around my chest until I can’t breathe. “Bryce, you’re replaced. Pack your shit and get out.”

Bryce rolls his eyes. “Oh, so scary. We don’t live together anymore, asstown.”

Micah doesn’t pay attention to him; his nose is pressed into the top of my head and he’s breathing deeply, like this is the last time we’re going to see each other.

 _It’s not_ , I scold myself.

“I’ll miss you,” he says, so quietly that the words are just a brush against my hair.

“I’ll miss you too.”

“Call me?”

“Duh.”

“Text me?”

“Double duh.”

He relocates his hands to my cheeks; looks at me for a second. I love his eyes. Under the shadow of his hair, which he’s grown out, they’re the same brown as topsoil right after it rains, rich and dark, glinting with tiny, tiny flecks of silver and black.

“I love you,” he whispers.

I search his face, trying to memorize every tiny detail of it. I’ll see it over thousands of video calls, probably, but it won’t be the same as it is right in front of me; it’ll be blurry and a bit grainy, because T-Mobile doesn’t really have the best Internet connection where I live. “I love you too.”

He kisses me, slow and sweet, and I don’t care if people see, because I’m surrounded by a bunch of my friends who could kick anyone’s ass, and then devastate you emotionally afterwards if you weren’t crushed into quite enough pieces.

Somehow, he slips from my grasp, and we’re all waving as he goes to join the line. He waves back, and we watch him until he has to hand his passport to the customs officer, and he unloads all the metal on his person, and then steps into the full body scanner.

“Fuck, this is weird,” Queenie says, when he gives us one last wave, then disappears.

“This good-bye was too tearful and disgusting,” Jackie says. “I’m going home and I’m going to watch badass movies about kung-fu experts kicking butt.”

Ella snorts and rolls her eyes. “By that, do you mean you’re going to spend the night crying in a blanket tent, eating ice cream and watching replays of k-dramas?”

“Fuck you,” Jackie says mildly as he turns to leave. “Colleen, I’ll drive you back to your place if you want.”

“Yeah.”

“Bye.” I hug Collie.

I hug Jackie.

I hug them all.

I volunteer to take the U-Haul back to its home because when I Google it, it turns out the place is only a couple of blocks away from the university dorms.

“Thanks, Lucky,” Queenie says.

“’Course.”

It’s not bad—not as bad as I thought it would be.

My phone buzzes in my pocket while I’m driving the U-Haul, and I ignore it because I’m driving, but when I unlock my phone as I’m walking back to my dorm, I have a message notification from Micah and even though it’s freezing out and I should be keeping my hands in my pockets so I don’t get frostbite, I text back.

Micah: Hey, darling

me: hey urself

me: u havent been on tv yet, so im assuming nobody at security complained?

Micah: Of course

Micah: They wanted to do a strip search, but I wouldn’t let them ;)

me: ugh what a shame

me: u couldve provided some entertainment for the five oclock news

Micah: You would’ve enjoyed that, wouldn’t you’ve?

me: absolutely

me: but wtf is that grammar

Micah: Okay, you know what, no need to make it personal, I didn’t know how to phrase it, okay?

me: lmao

Micah: 🖕🏼

me: are u in the waiting room rn?

Micah: WAITING ROOM?

me: 🖕🏻

me: idk what its called!

Micah: Heh.

me: 🖕🏻🖕🏻🖕🏻

Micah: Yeah. Did you know I walked past a ton of alcohol and makeup and fast-food stores to get to the gate?

me: alcohol? wow, u shouldve gotten me some

Micah: You’re not legal

Micah: I might go get myself some though

me: ouch

Micah: Bises, darling

me: have fun giving your entire wallet to god for eight ounces of sherry

me: everything is stupidly overpriced at airports

Micah: True

Micah: Might have to pass on the sherry, God

Micah: Can he hear me?

me: no i think hes drunk

Micah: It’s the sherry isn’t it

Micah: Imagine how much wine you’d even have to drink to get plastered

Micah: Is God an alcoholic?

me: lmao u would know

me: youre the one who got shitfaced off cognac at dinner yesterday and wouldnt stop running ur mouth about how much you “love us all so much and maybe i shouldntve accepted that promotion and actually ill call them rn and decline” and then jason had to steal ur phone so u wouldnt do anything stupid and then thirty minutes later u were crying because “isnt turkish delight amazing?”

Micah: I thought everyone agreed we were never going to bring that up

me: seriously, what drugs were u on?

me: turkish delight is fucking disgusting

Micah: That’s because you’ve never had the good kind

me: ive had every kind youve ever shoved in my mouth because i love you and thus humor you even when youre wrong, and its all been disgusting

Micah: ☹️

me: dont give me that face

Micah: ☹️☹️☹️

Micah: I’ll convince you yet

me: never

Micah: I’ll get a Japanese guru to teach me brainwashing

Micah: Besides, that’s not the only thing I’ve ever shoved in your mouth

me: some of the things u put in my mouth are better than others

me: jfc are you seriously horny already?! you haven’t even left mn yet!

Micah: I know, imagine how bored I’m going to be ugh ☹️

me: ill have to be sure to visit u then ;)

Micah: I’ll leave a key under the front mat for you

me: make sure you get a nice inconspicuous one that says “i ❤️ hentai” or something

Micah: Babe

me: come on, youre going to JAPAN, live a little!

Micah: I think I’ll live by, first of all, not giving my elderly neighbors a stroke

me: YOUR NEIGHBORS ARE ELDERLY?

me: also its japan, im sure theyve seen worse

Micah: Okay, maybe, but that a moot point

Micah: Also, I don’t know. I’m renting a small place from a friend but he won’t dish on the neighbors

me: i cant believe u agreed to live in his place when you dont know who the neighbors are

me: what if theyre serial killers?

Micah: What if *I’m* a serial killer? 😳

me: you could never

me: youre too gay to be a serial killer

Micah: Maybe I’m Ted Cruz but homosexual

me: so, republican?

Micah: HAHA

me: we might have to break up bae

me: i dont know if i can date a republican i dont think my parents will let me

Micah: You still live with your parents? What are you, Asian?

me: either that or jesus

Micah: First of all, you watch far too much Robin Williams

Micah: Second, I don’t think you’re allowed to say that, you’re not even remotely Christian

me: hahahah

Micah: Hey, by the way

Micah: Security said they found something pretty interesting in one of my bags

me: oh?

Micah: Would you care to share why the BFF is coming along to Japan with me?

me: i didnt want you to be lonely

Micah: I could never be lonely with you around

me: make sure it stays that way ;)

Micah: It will, now that the BFF is here to remind me

me: i want u to know im still super proud of that

me: i thought u were going to find it for sure

me: my heart was beating so hard it fell out onto the floor of the fucking airport when u opened your bag to get a piece of gum out

Micah: Hahahaha

Micah: Serves you right

Micah: I knew something was going on

me: whaaaaaat? no

Micah: Yeah. You’re so bad at lying, babe

me: im not :(

Micah: You kind of are

Micah: But it’s okay

Micah: How the fuck did you even fit it in there

me: don’t tell, but i had to do a little surgery on him

Micah: Surgery?

me: i took out some of his stuffing

me: dont worry my mom made me save it so now its in a tupperware under my bed

Micah: No! Now he won’t be as plushie when I squish him and think of you :(

me: YOU BETTER BE SQUISHING HIM IN A TOTALLY 100% PG13 MANNER, MICHAEL QUENTIN SCOTT

Micah: Heh

Micah: Of course

Micah: As long as you come to visit

me: dont worry, youll soon be driving me away with a hammer, thats how often ill visit you

Micah: Promise?

me: pinkie promise.

Micah: Wow, a period

Micah: I’ll hold you to that, M & M

me: i sure hope so :)

I do visit him—several times. As much as my tight schedule and broke college budget allows me to. He keeps offering to fly me over, but every time, I tell him I want to do it on my own.

That I _can_ do it on my own.

He grumbles about this, of course, quite a bit, but I never take his money, and he has to give up at some point. Besides, I’ve got a paid internship now, which is nice, even though I’m basically just a glorified errand boy, which means I no longer have to ask Mom and Dad for money—well, for _as much_ money.

The first time I go to Japan is two and a half months after he leaves, because our friends pool their money to buy me a round-trip ticket for Japan for my birthday and our two-year anniversary. I spend a week there, awed by the sights. He takes me to a garden he says makes him think of me, and he holds my hand while we walk under the cherry blossoms. We get someone to take a Polaroid of us under one of the trees, and it’s not until after the colors come out that I realize that though I’m grinning at the camera, he’s looking at me, the softest expression on his face.

The second time is seven months after he leaves, because I want to visit him before school starts and I get all caught up in schoolwork. We go out to eat, but I try it and decide I hate sushi, so we ditch the restaurant and buy a sinful amount of mochi to have back at the house. His lips are sticky and taste like mint and lemons when I kiss him. I spend five weeks there.

The third time is a year after he leaves, because I’m on winter break and I’ve just failed a higher calculus course, and I’m missing him something worse than fierce. We sleep tangled around each other, because I get cold easily and he’s the warmest, hottest thing I’ve ever been near, and when his arms are around me, my brain doesn’t think quite so hard. I stay for two weeks, and he hides the slightly-deflated B.F.F. in my suitcase when I leave. I don’t stop smiling for another week after that. Bryce says we’re so sweet we’re giving him cavities.

The fourth time is a year and a half after he leaves; all seven of us go to Japan to act touristy. When Bryce drags everyone to the Rainbow Bridge, though, I stay back with Micah and he fucks me senseless over the table. He must be really bored, and I feel bad not being here as often, because he’s acquired a shit-ton of toys, and he likes to work his way methodically through them whenever I come to visit and fine, we’re a _little_ bit kinky; what’s wrong with that? I like it when he orders me around, okay? We spend three months there. On the last day, Micah gives me a hickey the size of Alaska under my ear, which Bryce complains about the whole plane ride back. Loudly. I just grin, because I’ve hidden the B.F.F. in _that_ drawer, so I know he’ll be thinking of me the next time he does something fun.

The week after that, Queenie leaves for Oxford.

Jackie leaves for the University of Miami.

Ella tells us she’s met someone, and they’ve been going steady for six months now, so she’s going to live with him in Australia.

Jason goes to defend that client in Los Angeles and decides that he likes the city—and also his client, though he _swears_ he keeps it “strictly professional” with her until she comes off scot-free in court.

Collie carts herself off to Senegal as part of a student exchange program.

Soon enough, it’s just me and Bryce left in Minnesota. Even though we see a little less of each other, because he’s busy modelling, all eight of us are on group calls so often, at ridiculous times of day to account for all of our different time zones, that Mom and Dad sometimes have to bang on my door and yell at me to go to sleep or do my homework.

I still love them, though.

But life isn’t perfect.

It never is.

A month later, Mom weakly tells Dad, “Honey, I _really_ don’t think that these lumps are just fat,” because even though I love my parents, they’re the kind of people who try herbal medicines and tinctures and acupuncture first and a certified M.D. second (don’t look at me like that, I still got all my shots, okay), and since she’s been complaining about the lumps for five years and nothing has made them go away yet, we go to the doctor. I don’t really know what Stage IV cancer is, when the doctor comes back with _that_ look on his face and sheaves of paper and says she should consider chemotherapy to get rid of the tumors though even _that_ might not work, but I do by the end of the day. I’m jammed in my closet, fighting my panicking mind, my legs jammed against my chest and my knees wet with tears, when I fumble with my phone to FaceTime Micah, sure he’s going to be asleep. But he picks up, and he’s there, and that’s all that matters.

I fail two more classes that semester, and Mom and Dad hug me while I cry, and we all sleep together in the same bed—something we haven’t done since I was a kid—even though it’s really crammed because it’s only a queen.

That’s the last time she spends a full night at home. By afternoon, she’s in an ambulance to the hospital.

The fifth time I visit him is the most important one.

It’s the day before my twenty-first birthday.

Two years after he’s gone to Japan and almost exactly three years after we first met. Tomorrow it will be. In Japan, it almost already is.

I don’t tell him I’m coming, because I want it to be a surprise.

The best kind of surprise.

I go to the hospital first, because I want to see my mom. I _need_ to see Mom, before I get on that plane.

I’ve come to hate hospitals; their smell, the color, the fluorescent lights. The aura of sickness that seems to hover around them. My brain starts to go into overdrive whenever I’m so much as a block away from one, and it usually takes me ten minutes of sitting in the car to fight back the waves of nausea and beat my thoughts back into submission so that I can get out onto the pavement and have my legs _not_ collapse underneath me when I want to go in.

That day, it takes forty-five minutes. It would’ve taken longer, if Dad hadn’t texted me, but I force myself out of my car and into the sterilized building and shove my hands in my pockets on the elevator ride up to her room so that nobody can see them shaking.

She’s alone in the room, no nurses or anything. She’s hooked up to so many things; wires connect her to the bed, to pouches of water, to flashing machines that are so confusing that my brain starts to panic again. She’s so thin; so pale.

“M & M,” she says. She smiles broadly. Because fuck, she might be sick, but she’s still the same woman.

“Hey, Mom,” I say, and my voice breaks more than hers does.

“Sit down, baby,” she says, and I do. And I hold her hand, and we talk about nothing in particular—the weather, the birds, the therapy dog that came to visit her yesterday—until I tell her what I’m going to do.

My voice shakes embarrassingly while I do, like I’m trying to talk while sitting in the bed of a truck going over a million potholes.

She’s silent for a moment when I finish, and I’m scared. I’m panicking, because what if she doesn’t approve? What if she wants me to wait? What if—

“Oh baby,” she says.

I swallow thickly. I’m looking down at our hands; have been looking at them since I started. We’ve intertwined our fingers despite that little plastic clip on her index finger.

“I know twenty is really young to—”

“Oh, shut up,” she says, and I’m startled enough to look up. She’s smiling, her eyes are glittering with tears.

“Huh?”

“You were always a worrier,” she says, squeezing my hand a little. She has to take breaths often when she talks, but besides that, it almost doesn’t show, because her voice is just as strong as it used to be. “Remember when you first took him to meet us?”

I scowl. “I thought you said we were never going to talk about that again, but _you’re_ allowed to bring it up?”

“I’m dying, baby,” she says, patting my hand, “I’m allowed to bring it up.”

And then the tears are back and I’m kind of choking on my throat. “Mom—”

“You were going to keep it a secret,” she says over me. “But then I caught you in your room, the day before, having a panic attack in your closet.”

“It wasn’t a _panic attack_ —”

She glares and I shut up. “Much better,” she says, patting my hand again. “Give other people a chance to talk sometimes, you rude thing.”

I roll my eyes.

“I thought you were smuggling weed and had been caught,” she announces. “Or something of the sort. Something bad, of course. So of course I called your dad over, and he thought you were having a seizure and dying. And we were about to call nine-one-one when you grabbed my hand and squeezed your eyes shut, and you told us you had a boyfriend.

“You sounded like you were going to vomit the whole time, and of course your dad was more surprised than I because I think you forgot to come out to him, baby. Of course, it was fine, we thought. And then you said that you were going to bring him over for lunch tomorrow and you were going to tell us tomorrow morning, but what if we didn’t like him? And what if we didn’t approve?

“And we assured you that it would be fine, because we thought you were dating another high schooler—I thought it was Todd? Trey? Whatever his name was, that you’d been hanging out with a little more than the others at the time.

“Of course I wanted to be all impressive and everything, so I decided I was going to cook, but you know I can’t cook to save my life; you’ve seen me burn water.”

I laugh.

Wipe away tears that are threatening to fall.

“So you go borrow the car at ten in the morning, because you want to be the cool kid for once, picking up your date, and I send your dad to Cub Foods to grab me some leeks.

“And then of course, I burn everything, and when your dad comes back twenty minutes later because god knows the man can’t pick leeks to save his life or come back from a store without toting at least half of everything that was on the shelves back with him, the house is on fire and we have to call the fire department, and by the time you pull up, there’s a couple of fire engines outside our house.

“I don’t think I’ve ever seen you come out of that car faster, baby, except that one time your dad thought it would be funny to tell you we were going to go to Disneyland after you’d just gotten out of school when you were six and to go pack your things.

“Anyway,” she says, flapping a hand before I can interrupt and say that was a stinky lie that I still haven’t quite one hundred percent forgiven Dad for, “you come rocketing up the driveway, yelling, and find me in the front yard sitting against the tree next to your dad bawling my eyes out because I might have just burned down the house, and today was supposed to be a nice day, and do you remember what you said to me?”

I shake my head mutely because tears are pricking my eyes now, because I remember, I remember what she’s talking about, that had been the most terrifying day of my life because I thought they were both dead, but I don’t remember what I said. I don’t actually remember running up the driveway, just that she was okay, that Dad was okay, that everything was going to be okay.

She’s holding my hand in both of hers, now. “You sat right down next to me and you gathered me in your arms, and you said, ‘Mom. What happened?’ and I replied, ‘I think I might have just burned our home down.’ That’s what I meant to say, at least, though I was crying so hard I don’t know how it came out, but I think you understood, because you put your head on my shoulder and said, ‘I don’t know how you could burn a home, Mom. A home is the people you love, and we’re all still right here.’”

I snort in kind of cry-laughter, because yeah, that does sound stupid enough to come out of my mouth.

“And you taught me the most valuable lesson of all, that day. So baby.” She uses her fingers to drag my chin around so we’re looking each other in the eye. Her eyes are so blue, like the pristine sky. “It doesn’t take an age to know whether someone’s your home or not. You do what you need to.”

I nod, and when I close my eyes, a tear spills over, tripping down my cheek.

She brings my hand to her mouth; kisses the back, then kisses the gold ring around my middle finger that had come from my birth grandfather, that I wore even though I didn’t know how to read the characters engraved on it.

“And then of course your dad saw your Michael coming up the drive and he turned to the both of us and he said, ‘You know, Mindy, I never thought I could be attracted to men, but—’”

“Mom!” I complain though a wet smile, smacking her blankets and sniffing loudly. “Moment ruined!”

She laughs, but after a couple of seconds, it turns into something else, and I just hold her hand tightly while her small body is wracked with coughs.

It passes, because it always does.

She’ll be okay.

“You’re my home, too,” I whisper.

“I know, baby.”

We’re silent for a little. My free hand is in my pocket, gripping warm metal. Turning it over.

Over, and over, and over.

“I’ve already told Dad,” I say.

She nods, eyes slipping shut. “I thought you would have.”

I feel my lips twitch a little. “Sorry for not telling you first. I know you’re nosy and always like to know everything before everyone else.”

She slaps my hand, but when I peek, she’s smiling, too.

Outside, a persistent robin is warbling.

 _Cheerily, cheer-up, cheer-up, cheer-up_.

“You’re sure?” she says eventually.

“Yeah,” I tell her. “I’m sure.”

It’s the only thing I’m _not_ worried about.

I haven’t told anybody else.

I haven’t told Collie, I haven’t told Bryce.

Nobody.

I haven’t even told them that I’m going to see him today.

My dad sees me off at the airport after I go back home for a couple hours, because he’s going to the hospital after to sit with Mom for a little while. It’s a quick affair, because I’m not taking anything with me. I can’t stay long, my flight back is right after, because I haven’t actually prepared to miss any classes and I’ve only called off from work for two days. All I’ve got is my backpack.

The plane ride is uneventful; between naps, I watch _Hamilton_ and _Dear Evan Hansen_ and grin a bit when I see the baby behind me staring at my laptop screen.

The Tokyo airport is huge and confusing, as it is always, and when I step outside into the bright sunlight of noon, or almost-noon, really, I have to squint.

The future doesn’t feel like the future, but back here, it’s already the middle of my birthday, I’m already twenty-one, though it doesn’t really feel like it.

I have to fumble for Micah’s address when the taxi driver asks where I want to go, because I don’t have it memorized, but it doesn’t take long before we’re there.

Maybe I wasn’t quite telling the whole truth when I said I wasn’t worried about this. I always worry. But I’m not _as_ worried, when I compare it to the other things that are going on in my life: my fading friendships with my friend group, which is scattered across the globe; that stupid higher calculus class, which I’m taking for the third time and still failing; Mom.

I’m a little nervous, though. Nervous enough for my hands to be shaking a little when I get the key from under the mat (which, unfortunately, does not say ‘I ❤️ hentai’) and unlock the door. It’s Sunday, already, in Japan, so he should be home.

The house is quiet.

He could still be asleep, curled in the blankets. Or working, his hands tapping away on the computer, faster than I’d ever think possible, wearing those cat-eye glasses he never lets anyone see him in except me.

Or he could be out.

I hope he’s not out.

My phone buzzes in my pocket, but I ignore it.

Shut the door quietly behind me.

Set down my backpack.

I’m not breaking and entering. He said I could come for him whenever I wanted—I would always be welcome here, he always wants to see me.

The metal of the key cuts into my hand when I clench my fist around it.

My other hand is in my pocket, clenched around _It_. I had to take it out at customs, because it was metal.

I’d watched it like a hawk—stared at it until my eyes hurt. It took ages to pick out, and even longer to save up for, but it looked like him. Looked like it would fit him. I knew it would fit him. I got so worried they were going to take it away from me, even though I knew it didn't work like that.

 _Maybe the seller poured gunpowder into it_ , my brain had said. _Maybe it’s a reshaped bullet! Have you shoved a pistol up your ass recently and forgotten about it???_

The kitchen is empty.

The living room is empty.

I peek onto the porch, and then make for his bedroom. The door is closed, but not all the way; just pulled slightly ajar.

I swallow thickly.

 _Wait, wait, wait_ , my brain says. _What if—What if—_

I push the door open before it has a chance to vomit out anything else, because I want this. I want this more than anything else I’ve ever wanted, and I’m not going to let my stupid thoughts stop me, I can’t let my stupid thoughts stop me because then it will never happen.

I want to get what I want.

I _need_ to get what I want.

The door opens, a hushed whisper against the carpet.

The bed is rumpled, and there’s definitely someone there. For a moment, in my head, I’m falling to my knees in front of whatever deity above that there is and thanking them for letting Micah be here.

But then I freeze.

Because there’s definitely more than one lump under the sheets.

Micah’s on the bed. He’s on the bed, he’s curled up just like I thought he would be, because his favorite sleeping position is the fetal position, and his arms are wrapped around his chest like he’s giving himself a hug.

Sprawled an arm’s-length away is a girl.

A black-haired girl, with cherry lips and a heart-shaped face that has most definitely seen the inside of several plastic surgery clinics. She’s beautiful in that porcelain-doll k-pop-star kind of way and looks slender and tall—taller than me, but then, most people are.

She’s naked; the blanket has slipped low enough for me to see that: the curve of her breasts, a stained-pink nipple that’s playing peek-a-boo with the coverlet.

I don’t quite understand.

My brain is there, but for once in my life, it doesn’t say anything.

It’s silent.

There’s only white noise.

 _Micah’s in bed_ , I tell myself.

Testing out the words.

Tasting them.

Rolling them around on my tongue.

_Micah’s in bed, and there’s a girl next to him._

He’s wearing clothes, which is weird, because he usually likes to be naked when he goes to bed.

The girl stirs a little bit in sleep, and I snap back to myself.

I’m clutching the key, and _It_ , so hard that they’re cutting into my skin.

Micah’s in bed with a girl and she’s naked.

They—

They—

He—

I want to retch. I want to scream, and cry, because—

Because he’s mine. He’s supposed to be mine, all mine, just mine, not anybody else’s.

Michael Quentin Scott is supposed to be mine.

I can’t move.

I can’t move, I’m stuck to this carpet like I’m superglued here, and I’ll never be able to leave, and Micah will wake up, and he’ll look at me in disgust and think, _Why is he here?_

 _Yes, why are you?_ my brain asks, coming back online.

Why.

Why, why, why?

I don’t scream.

I don’t cry.

I leave.

I force myself to.

I pull the door closed, quietly.

Avoid all the creaky boards back to the door.

My legs are still numb. My arms are numb. My whole body is numb, even my heart, except for my hands, which are hot, hot, hot, and I wish that they’d melt everything they hold in them.

I take my backpack.

I go out through the front door.

Put the key back under the mat.

Walk down the driveway.

Part of me thinks it’s a lie. Micah isn’t in there, it’s a cutout of him with that girl, the real Micah is going to come down the driveway, chasing after me.

Because he wants me.

Because he’s mine.

He doesn’t come down the driveway.

I turn onto the street.

I just walk, and walk, and walk.

I don’t know where I’m going.

I can’t see the cars that pass. Can barely see the streetlights.

My hands fumble with my phone.

Home. I want to go home.

I use Google Maps to walk to the airport.

I get past security.

I’m halfway to the gate when my phone rings.

I only pick up because it’s Dad. Even still, my hands are numb. My fingers are numb.

I swipe the screen.

Put it up to my ear.

“Hello?”

I want him to say, _It was a joke, Lucky. A joke, like Disneyland. Micah loves you. He’s coming for you._

He doesn’t say that.

He’s crying, and he says, “I’m sorry; baby; Lucky. She’s gone.”

And my hand’s numb, and my arm’s numb; my whole body’s numb, and it’s a miracle I don’t just drop the phone right there, but he’s talking again, telling me how _she just slipped away_ and it was _swift and painless_ and it’s _what she would’ve wanted_ and _I know how you feel_ , and I jerk back into myself; I’m clutching my phone so hard that I’m surprised it doesn’t crack; doesn’t fold right up in two.

I hang up on him, his voice through the phone cutting off mid-sentence, because I don’t want to hear it. I _can’t_ hear it.

I don’t want to hear anything right now.

And I hate myself so much in that moment, because if I weren’t _here_ , with a liar and with a cheater, I could’ve been _there_ ; I could’ve been with her.

And maybe, just maybe, she wouldn’t have gone.

Stupid thoughts, yeah, but I was twenty-one.

I was angry.

I was hurting.

I was so, so sad.

I delete his number. Block it. Unfriend and unfollow on all social media; block his profiles. Immediately start drawing black lines through the ten numbers that are worn into my mind like the ruts in a used road, that subconsciously, I know I’ll never forget; never be able to forget.

I sit on a bench, in the middle of a strange airport, and I don’t even know I’m crying until I feel the hot tears splattering across my hands.

No one looks twice, of course; it’s an airport.

A girl with blonde hair comes up to me. She gives me a couple of tissues, which I use, and a hug. She rubs my back and tells me it’ll be okay, and I think that she looks like Collie that one time in tenth grade when she bleached her hair at home and it all went wrong, and I cry harder, because nothing is like what it used to be anymore.

She sits with me until she says she needs to catch her flight. She tells me to keep my head high, and then she’s gone.

I run after her, last-second.

Press _It_ into her hand. I don’t want it anymore. Don’t want its reminder anymore.

Don’t want to think anymore.

I rein in my words enough to say thank you.

She wishes me luck.

What an oxymoron.

And then she’s gone.

I go home.

The plane.

An Uber.

Get to the house.

Open the front door.

All the photos on the wall are blurry.

Dad’s in bed, in the room he used to share with Mom, a picture album clutched so tightly in his hands that his knuckles are white.

I crawl under the sheets with him.

Don’t tell him what happened.

Because he knows.

I know he knows; he _has_ to know, and I know he’s been crying, too.

For me.

For Mom.

He holds me against his chest, against the covers that barely still smell of her.

Pressed into his shirt, I cry myself to sleep.

Because of everything that was. Because of everything that could have been. Because of everything that wasn’t, no matter how much I _wanted_.

Because I only have a fraction of the home I’d had, now.


	4. Brunch Is Even More Homosexual and Repressed Than Originally Planned

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> My university just had Thanksgiving break and I told myself I was going to do so much writing and I... didn't. This is the last of my prewritten stuff, I'm actually going to have to start working for my pay now 😬😬😬. In other news, I'm kind of reobsessed with the Hamilton soundtrack, _Say No to This_ in particular, which, uhm, Michael? 👀 (I promise I'll make him redeemable) (or try to)
> 
> Also: just as, like, an obligatory (and obvious) warning, please please do not call the phone number in this chapter. I made it up and do not know if it belongs to a Real Person™ and they probably do not deserve to be bothered because of this rando story on ao3 :) thanks
> 
> Anyway, thank you so much everyone who reads and leaves kudos and comments, y'all give me so many endorphins :)))) I hope you have a wonderful holiday season!

_What a great way to reopen old wounds_ , I think bitterly, as Michael stares at me from his chair next to the patio door, as far away from me as he could possibly be at this table, which feels much too small. He’s hasn’t looked away once.

My brain is silent, because it seems to be able to sense that if it says one little thing right now, I’ll literally put a chopstick through my eye.

I can’t look at him.

Bryce is picking the shrimp off my plate as I pile it on the edge, because I hate shrimp.

Its texture is weird; chewy and crunchy at the same time.

Everyone else is busy trying to overcompensate for the awkwardness. They’re all talking, very loudly, but they can’t disguise the frequent pauses in the conversation, because nothing of what they’re saying fits together: they’re just blurting out whatever’s on their mind, because everyone can feel this tension in the air—even I can feel the tension in the air; it’s so thick you’d need a chainsaw to go at it.

“Lucky,” Collie says, turning on me, because I’m not talking enough, something’s wrong, I’m always running my mouth. “How’s your dad?”

“Fine.”

I pick out another shrimp.

A long time ago, after Michael and I told him we’d started dating, Bryce took me out for dim sum. That in itself was fine (he told me that if Michael ever did something stupid, just tell him, and he’d kick Michael’s ass for me, wherein I pointed out that I could kick Micah’s ass all on my own, to which he squinted at my almost nonexistent muscles, and I grumbled, _One day_ ), but there had been this one moment that he bit into a whole shrimp and a little bit of red stuff came out from the head that was most definitely not sauce and my mind said that the only other options were either brains or blood, and that’s part of the reason why I don’t eat shrimp anymore, at least not unless it’s cut and cooked in very small pieces with a lot of other stuff that I _do_ eat.

“How are the two of you getting along?”

“Fine.”

“How’s…” she struggles for a moment, “your mom?”

“Still dead,” I say, deadpan, because I’m feeling nasty, even though I know that’s not what she means.

She flinches. “I—”

I swing my head toward Bryce, because he’s also been suspiciously silent. “How was your modelling thing?” I hear come out of my mouth. Everyone else has been blabbing about how their lives have been; how their last days in England and Australia and Kazakhstan and on the coast have been.

Bryce’s eyes flick to Michael.

I don’t look.

I can feel his damn stare boring a hole through my head, making my skin prickle with heat.

 _Find somewhere better to put your eyes_ , I want to say; I want to say it so bad. _Ella looks a little like that girl in Japan, why don’t you look at her?_ even though I know it’s not like that, it’s never been like that, and I immediately feel bad for even thinking that, because I love Ella; she’s one of my best friends.

“It was fine,” Bryce says slowly, but he’s not quite enthusiastic enough, because Jackie immediately starts rattling off questions for him, demanding details.

Michael is still staring.

My brain, unhelpfully, keeps playing back that look on his face when I’d walked in.

The surprise—shock, really, that’s what it had been more of—and then happiness, like he had been so happy to see me, and the hope, like it was back to how it had been, and all he needed was me, he only wanted me; and all _I_ had wanted was to punch him in his stupid face. (And sit on his dick, but that’s just because I’m horny all the time because I can’t really invite Grindr hookups over to my house when I live with my _dad_ , plus like half the people on there have “no asians!!!” written in their bios and that’s just fucking _racist_ , and _all of this has got nothing to do with him at all_. I hate him. I _do_.)

The gang doesn’t know the whole story.

I didn’t tell them the whole story.

I couldn’t tell them.

I told them a very abbreviated version of what had happened. I’d gone to Japan, because I’d wanted to show up for my birthday and our anniversary. I’d seen him cheating; when they pressed, because they didn’t believe me, I told them that he’d been in bed with a girl, naked, and that only ever means one thing. You don’t ever just sleep, naked, in a bed with someone unless there’s amorous intent. Ergo, fucking.

Bryce had come over to my place to comfort me, and after I asked him if he’d still be here and he told me he’d always be here, I heard him calling someone as I knotted myself in the blankets on my bed because I needed to sleep—I needed to escape—but I didn’t drop off as fast as I wanted because I heard him swearing, quietly but vehemently, on his end of the line, and I knew who he was talking to, and then he went outside and started yelling.

I told them I blocked him.

I told them I didn’t want to see him. Didn’t want to talk to him. Didn’t want to think about him.

I knew they were all looking at each other and thinking, _Is this really the best way to do things?_ but I didn’t care—it was the only time I didn’t care about their opinions.

I didn’t make them choose. I didn’t make them choose between him and me. I knew it could never be like that, because all of us were tied together; tangled together so tightly that if even one thread was pulled out, the whole lot of us would fall apart.

So our calls ended up more and more staggered so that I could ignore him, and they’d always glance at each other a little when I came on, like I was a fragile doll that needed to be protected.

Whatever.

It didn’t _mean_ anything. I was so over it.

“So, uh, Michael. How was the trip back?” Jason asks, which has been the first time that question’s come up today, and they’re all staring at me even though the question was for him, and I want to snap that _I_ wasn’t the one who’d been there.

 _And that was the whole problem all along, wasn’t it?_ my brain laughs.

Michael doesn’t say anything at first, and an extremely awkward silence falls, only broken by the ticking of the antique clock that Queenie’s parents have.

There’s a loud clatter as Jackie’s plate falls onto the floor, scattering food everywhere, along with his eating utensils, and everyone’s eyes snap to him.

Except for _fucking_ Michael.

Jackie almost swears, seems to remember we’re in someone else’s parents’ house, and stands quickly. “Sorry. Lemme just… go… get stuff—clean up, you know—”

He has scoot past Michael’s chair, because the two of them are sitting next to each other.

I stand, my chair screeching jarringly against the floor.

“I’ll help.”

_Because if I have to stay in this room with him one more second, I know I can’t do it—I know I’m going to look, and I know I won’t be able to do anything but devour him with my eyes, because I just want to see—just once—_

It feels like salvation to turn my back on that table, to not have to look at any of them anymore, just the back of Jackie’s purple tank top as I follow him to those swinging white doors. It wouldn’t take much to leave. I could leave. I could put on my shoes, and disappear out the door, and not talk to any of them for a week because _Why hadn’t anybody_ said _anything?_

Maybe I’m a masochist, because I don’t really want to leave.

Jackie’s collecting a sinful number of paper towels, wetting them under the tap and muttering something about being dead. He practically jumps when I enter the kitchen, going all bug-eyed.

“Lucky,” he says. “I didn’t know, I swear to god, they didn’t tell me, I didn’t even know he was going to be showing up when I got here—Neither of you were supposed to be here, we were supposed to be talking about how we were gonna organize a dinner with _everyone_ everyone and how to handle the whole situation and—”

“Whatever. It doesn’t matter.” I look at the dripping contents of his hands. “I’m pretty sure that’s enough paper towels to speed up global warming by at least three years.”

He looks at the soggy white mass. “Yeah, shit, man, do you think I need to put soap on it?”

I don’t answer, so he pumps an obscene amount of lime green dish soap onto the mass and sticks it under the tap again. We stand there, watching the water pummel the already-soaked towels.

“It was fine,” comes Michael’s voice from the dining room.

“Right,” Ella says, and her voice is so cold that it sounds like Hell is freezing over.

“Remind me _why_ you quit your job again?” Bryce says. “And why you’re here? Nobody told me you were coming.”

“Would you have done anything differently if you had known?” Michael asks, and his voice is just as cold as Ella’s, and I know this isn’t the first fight he’s had with Bryce, they used to fight all the time because that’s what best friends do, but it’s the first time the two of them genuinely sound like they want to rip each others’ throats out. “Collie invited me.”

I know without being there that Bryce is swinging his head to glare, betrayed, at Collie.

I’m angry—I’m so angry at her, for not telling. For not saying anything.

I don’t even know why I came.

I don’t know what I had been expecting.

“Don’t look at me like that,” she snaps. “I didn’t know what this was supposed to be. I wasn’t on the phone call on Thursday.”

“Yeah, well, it would’ve been nice to have a warning, because neither was I—”

“What, were you too busy getting laid?” Michael says nastily.

“First of all,” Bryce snarls, “ _fu_ —”

“Bryce!” Queenie barks.

Her parents have been quiet this whole time, either recognizing that this is something we need to work out on our own or deciding that they wanted to take it all in and memorize it so that they could gossip about it later. All the Asians I know are terrible gossips.

I know Bryce is grinding his teeth together. “You’d know a bit about that, wouldn’t you, _Michael_.”

“Maybe I would,” Michael growls back, and if my heart wasn’t stomped into the floor already, that does the trick.

Then Jackie’s wrapped around me, and he’s saying, harshly, in my ear, “He doesn’t mean that, Lucky, _he_ _doesn’t mean it_ ,” and I’m clenching my teeth together so hard I’m sure my molars are going to crack, and my throat is aching with the force it’s taking for me to remain presentable.

“Pardon my language,” Ella says, “but what the _fuck_ does that mean.”

“Ella!”

“I already said pardon my language! And I’m sure your parents have heard worse, I _heard_ Mr. Zhang yelling in Hokkien about dog shit when the shrimp crackers were burning, so don’t even give me that look.”

Jackie’s gone; the double-hinged doors are swinging in his wake, and then Queenie’s parents are coming in, carrying their plates, leaving the kids to work out their own problems. Who am I kidding, Queenie probably asked them very nicely to leave so that she could swear at us all and then hit us over the head with a thesaurus and then yell at us to behave, because that’s what she does and we love her.

I’m digging my fingernails so hard into my forearm that it’s going to take a while for the marks to fade. Queenie’s mom pats my arm, and when I look at her, her creased face is full of kindness.

“Are you alright?” she says, and I say I’m fine, I’m fine, I’ll be fine, because I’m thinking, _This could be my mom, she could look like my real mom, only I don’t have a mother anymore, I lost two of them_ , and I don’t want to cry.

I’ll be fine because I _have_ to be fine. I don’t have any other options.

“Why are you back over here?” Bryce asks Michael flatly.

“You’d think I’m unwanted, with that tone of voice.”

“Oh, I’m sorry, I just thought Japan was such an amazing experience for you and the company was so great that you were going to stay there. Forever.”

“What do you want to hear me say? That Japan was sub-par? Would that ease the guilt on your chest?”

“And what about the guilt on _your_ chest, _Mi_ chael? How are you feeling about that?”

“That’s enough,” Queenie orders, before Michael can open his mouth and grind my heart into dust with his heel.

“Your friend is asking for you,” Queenie’s mom says, patting my arm again, before she goes to help her husband with washing the dishes that are still dirty from the meal prep. Running water starts up, background noise to what’s happening in the dining room.

She doesn’t say which one.

“It doesn’t matter how I feel about it, you’ve decided to treat me like _I_ ’m the bad guy, here,” Michael says.

“Because you—” Bryce starts to spit out.

“God damn it,” Collie snaps, slamming her hand on the table and rattling the plates. “Is it too much to ask for you guys to act civilized for _one hour_?”

“Define civilized,” Jackie says unhelpfully.

“Shut up,” she snaps at him.

“Can we take a step back to look at this?” Jason asks, and he sounds a bit wary to even be stepping in. “Because I, for one, think that—”

“Okay, whatever you think doesn’t matter, because you weren’t here,” Ella says.

“Oh, yeah,” Jackie says sarcastically, “because you were definitely _here_ , Ella.”

“You’re one to talk! Bed any girls in Miami, Jackie?”

I flinch.

“If we’re discussing who was _here_ , I think _I_ ’m the only one who can attest to the fact that Lucky didn’t leave his damn house for two weeks straight and lost his job because of it,” Bryce snaps.

I grimace.

“I was out of town,” Collie protests weakly.

“Okay, that’s enough,” Queenie snaps. “We’ve had over a hundred video calls since then and this should be worked out by now.”

“Well, it’s _not_ —”

“Video calls are a poor damn substitute for faces, you know that as well as I do—”

“It doesn’t _matter_ if video calls are a good substitute or not, this whole thing is ridiculously blown out of proportion!”

“Technically, this whole argument is everyone else’s fault. They’re aiming their blows for beneath the belt—”

“Yeah, because _Michael_ would know a lot about beneath the belt—”

“Can you give this to Jackie, please?” Queenie’s mom asks me sweetly, and hands me a new plate because I find my feet carrying me to the doorway even though I don’t really want to go there and then everyone shuts up comically fast when I appear, like they don’t know that I can _hear_ them from the kitchen, the walls and doors aren’t _soundproof_.

Michael’s staring at me, only now his eyes are black with anger from the argument and that reminds me of when his eyes would go black for a different reason, and Bryce is glaring at him like he wants to murder him with a porcelain bowl and a napkin, and Collie is looking at me, miserably, like she knows I’m pissed at her and it’s going to take a severe amount of groveling (read: two days, tops) for me to even _think_ about forgiving her.

Jackie is still on his knees cleaning up his mess, and under the glass table, his head is level with Michael’s lap, and that just makes me think about _her_ , and what they must’ve done that night, and I don’t look at him, because if I do, I don’t know what I’ll do. I don’t want to know what he looks like, because I know he looks like he’s always looked like; I saw him, nothing has changed. His hair is still a wild mess of curls that’s threatening to turn into a loose afro, because I’d told him I liked it long seven months after we started dating, and his eyes are still that exact same shade of dark-chocolate-brown, and his skin is still smooth and polished because he’s the only man I know who actually has a skincare routine, what the hell, and the only difference is that he has these small lines of tightness at the corners of his eyes and mouth, like he frowns more often than smiles, now.

Fine.

Serves him right.

“I, uh,” Collie says, shifting uncomfortably in her chair.

“I want to point out that I am guilty of nothing, because I’ve barely participated in this conversation,” Jason says to me.

“Does that make you feel good about yourself?” Ella asks him.

“Funnily enough, actually, it does.”

“Queenie’s parents want your plate,” I say flatly to Jackie.

He throws a soiled napkin full of noodles onto the offending dish and we trade.

Nobody says anything else.

I go back into the kitchen.

Scrape the mess into the trash can, even though Queenie’s parents are protesting that I’m a guest and I don’t need to help out.

I hear the floor creak; Michael’s mutter that he’s going to the bathroom.

“Nice job,” Ella says sarcastically, as soon as Michael’s gone.

“I didn’t _do_ anything!” Jackie says.

“You’re lucky Queenie isn’t smacking you over the head for dumping the contents of your plate all over the floor. You know that stuff stains.”

“I wouldn’t smack him over the head,” Queenie grumbles.

“Oh yes, because I definitely did it on purpose!”

“Don’t even try to lie and say you didn’t,” Jason says. “I saw what you did.”

“Right, I’m so sorry that Michael was making the whole thing _awkward_ and _hormonal_ by staring at Lucky like he wanted to rip his clothes off with his eyes—”

“Jackie!” Queenie yells, clearly trying to protect my gentle sentimentalities even though I’m not present, but that doesn’t deter him.

“—and Lucky’s spent this entire meal moping and looking like he wants to climb back in Michael’s lap—”

“That’s not true,” Collie protests, and I stop planning her immediate death, because her standing up for me enamors her to me a little bit even though she invited _Michael Quentin Scott_ to what was supposed to a _nice_ afternoon.

Because she’s right; that _isn’t_ true.

“Oh, let’s be real, we all still think he belongs there, and you’d be lying to yourselves if you said otherwise, this whole shit is stupid and Michael keeps saying he didn’t sex up that girl no matter what Lucky saw. Just because they’re so repressed that they can’t get within three feet of each other without wanting to bone sans talking—”

“ _Jackie!_ ”

“— _What_? You _know_ he thought those stupid flowers were for him, fuck, man, _I_ thought the flowers were for him, did you see the look on his face? He looked about ready to have Lucky over the sofa—which is disgusting, but it would’ve been funny to see Queenie throw them out before they got to it like dogs in heat—And the only issue here is that they goddamn refuse to talk to each other because they’re so gay that if you even say the word ‘feelings’ within a fifty-foot radius of them, they run away screaming waving their hands over their heads, and this whole problem would be solved if they’d just go back to Michael’s house and fuck already—because they sure as hell can’t fuck at _Lucky_ ’s place since he’s moved back in with his dad—and then Michael can man up and grow a pair of balls and admit he made a mistake, so Lucky can forgive him and then decide to get back together because let’s be real, neither of them are over it even though it’s been two years, and if you’re still _that_ hung up over your ex after two damn years, you obviously belong together.”

Silence greets his rant, but nobody’s denying anything, which I am absolutely outraged about, and I want someone else to stand up for me because I _don’t_ still want him, and I _definitely_ don’t want to bone him, what the fuck, I’d be happy if I never fucking saw him again in my life.

 _Would you be?_ my brain asks, sensing the lie.

_Fuck off. You were silent three seconds ago, go back to it being that way._

_No, because you’re repressed and gay. Gay for Michael Quentin Scott._ Still _. Aren’t you, Lucky Sommers?_

_Fuck off!_

Queenie’s parents are murmuring together in Chinese, their words strange and unfamiliar. My ears are straining to catch any sound from the dining room; are they whispering?

Bryce must open his mouth, because I hear Queenie say, “Shut up, Bryce,” in her thinking voice.

“I didn’t _say_ anything!”

They’re far too quiet to be up to anything good. It doesn’t matter, though, because I hear Michael’s footsteps coming back into the dining room and then Queenie’s mother is asking if I could go see if they’re done with any of the food back in there and so I find myself in the doorway again, glaring at them, and they’re suddenly all fighting over the fried squid like it’s the most enrapturing thing they’ve ever known and perhaps it holds the secrets to the universe, like they hadn’t just been saying I should get back together with the World’s Worst Person.

Michael’s staring at me, still, and it’s making me break out in goosebumps, I don’t know why, so I put my gaze on the table.

“Are you done with anything?”

“No,” Bryce says, mouth full.

“Michael,” Queenie snaps. “Stop staring at Lucky unless you have something to say to him.”

Then, and only then, do I feel the weight of his gaze lift a little.

Because he has nothing to say.

_Or does he? Would you listen to him, if he did?_

_Fuck you_.

 _You can do that later_ , Michael’s voice purrs in my ear, a memory from a lifetime ago.

I kick it out.

I don’t need to hear that right now, no matter what thrills it sends through me.

“And you. Lucky. Sit down or leave; I don’t care which you do, and I’m not—nobody’s—going to judge you for whichever you choose to do, but you’re single-handedly giving everyone anxiety standing there like a miniature grim reaper.”

It’s polite, everything’s so polite, and it’s this faux politeness because there are elders in the next room over and everyone knows that Queenie’s at her limit with the swearing and crassness in front of her parents and the next person who says so much as ‘heck’ is getting tossed out by their ear. If it was just us eight, this whole place would be a train wreck by now with food on the walls, Queenie dashing wine in someone’s face (it’s happened before), half-naked people yelling at each other while standing on the table, someone accidentally stabbed, and police on the way.

Fine, so we’re dramatic. So what? Half of us are gay, and all of us are Asian.

But none of us are immune to Queenie’s glares.

I sit down.

The look on her face softens a little, like she understands, and I find that I’m not as mad anymore, just tired, and I want a hug.

Half my food has disappeared since I’ve first stood up to go to the kitchen.

“You weren’t here,” Bryce says, when I point this out to him.

“And you still have zero manners.”

He shrugs. “I’ve accepted it. You should accept it too.”

My phone buzzes. I pull it out of my pocket.

“No phones at the table,” Queenie says, but it’s my dad, and I tell her so, and she lets it slide.

Dad: Hey baby.

Dad: I know ur busy, but can u pick up groceries on ur way back?

Me: Ok

Me: What do you need?

Dad: Cheese, broccoli, lemons, chicken bread.

Me: Ok

Dad: Thx.

Me: What kind of cheese? Bread?

Dad: Cheddar, whole wheat plz.

Me: Ok

Dad: How’s brunch?

Me: Fine

Dad: K. Thx. Love u! See u tonight.

Me: Love you too

Brunch is fine.

I’m fine.

 _Liar_ , taunts my brain.

I’m tempted to call Dad out on his “chicken bread,” even though I know what he means, but I stop myself—I don’t need to spread my bad mood to other people—by swiping out of my apps, having to jam my fingers down because the screen’s peeling off my phone and isn’t as sensitive as it used to be. My phone’s the same one I’ve had for seven years now, so it’s terribly outdated (and doesn’t even have the most recent operating system because my house has to be the only one in suburban America that still hasn’t installed Wi-Fi, and I’m too self-conscious to ask Queenie for her parents’ Wi-Fi password because I’m not even supposed to have my phone out right now), but even though my friends keep yelling at me to get a new one, I don’t really have enough spare money for one, and I figure that I don’t _need_ a new one, because this one still functions well enough, so what’s the point? I’m not _rich_ , alright. I know my dad feels bad, because I can see it in his eyes, but I tell him it’s fine; it’s a _want_ , not a _need_ , and we have more pressing things to spend the money on, especially since he’s retired and I quit cartooning for BuzzFeed and essentially no longer have a job. ( _I’m a_ freelance artist, I tell myself, because that sounds classier than _I don’t get enough money from my Patreon supporters to afford avocados on the reg anymore._ )

Michael pulls out his phone. He has a new phone, of course, because _he_ ’s probably rich, and it’s shiny and flashy in the sunlight and is probably the latest iPhone model or something, and I am supremely jealous.

“No phones at the table,” Queenie squawks at him. And then at Jackie, because he’s pulling his phone out, too, under the whiny excuse that _Everyone_ else _is doing it._

My phone buzzes again.

Unknown number.

+1 (763) 274-1084: Lucky

I squint at the screen. What the fuck?

“Can you guys go three seconds without touching those mind-numbing devices?” Queenie glares.

“I’m a millennial,” Jackie says, thumbing through Instagram. “If I’m not on social media at least once every five minutes, I’ll die. In fact, I believe it was getting dark while we were having lunch. No wonder such bullshit came out of my mouth.” He looks innocently in my direction, as if he knows I’d heard him the whole time and that I still kind of want to throw my chopsticks at his head.

Jason snorts.

“Careful, you sound like a boomer,” Bryce tells Queenie.

“You’re so white,” she says to Bryce.

“I’d been wondering if anyone had noticed,” he says with mock surprise, looking down at his spread hands.

I’m one touch away from deleting the thread when another text comes through.

+1 (763) 274-1084: I need to talk to you

My head shoots up.

It can’t not—it’s reflex, and I need to know—I know.

He’s not looking at me.

His phone is hidden in his lap and his glare is sparring with Ella’s, who looks like she’s seriously considering taking up being a serial killer as her new profession. The sun shines in through the glass patio door, glinting off the perfect snow in the lawn, outlining the straight line of his nose. There’s the tiniest ridge just a little way down it, where his glasses used to rest early on Saturday mornings, because even though he prefers contacts, they hurt his eyes, and he can’t go without either because he’s technically legally blind.

A lock of hair is curled around his ear, kissing the skin where his jaw ends. And is clenched, because both of them are pig-headed, and neither of them wants to be the first to look away. I hadn’t even heard what they had said; what one of them had said to set them both off.

My thumbs are descending onto the screen before I can tell myself this is a bad idea; this is such a bad idea; I’m going to ruin myself.

Me: Stop texting me

A reply comes so fast I wonder if he’s looked away from Ella, but my eyes are stuck to that little talking bubble at the bottom of the screen that says he’s typing out another message.

When it comes, it’s just as short as the first, and I know he’s deleted something.

+1 (763) 274-1084: No

+1 (763) 274-1084: I want to talk to you

Me: Delete my number

+1 (763) 274-1084: I can’t

Me: I’m going to block this number

Queenie has already thrown her hands into the air and given up, because now Jason is peering over Jackie’s shoulder and exclaiming, loudly and judgmentally, “You follow _Kim Kardashian_?!”

“She’s a _public figure_ ,” Jackie says defensively.

“Yeah, and filled with so much plastic that the world will probably end and she’ll still be lying fully formed in her coffin.”

“Fully formed?” Jackie says, offended. “What is she, an arthropod?”

+1 (763) 274-1084: I like your earring

I turn my phone off before I can be rash and answer, _You don’t get to compliment me on that._

Because he doesn’t. I got my ear pierced after Mom died, because I wanted to be able to carry around something of hers, so I walk around with a filament of gold dangling from my left earlobe that’s from her favorite set of jewelry Dad bought for her: a feminine, elegant thing, with glittering “peridot, rhodolite, amethyst, blue topaz, and citrine shards” (that’s what it said on the little seller’s ticket, to me they just look like little colorful crystals) tethered right above a swollen, pregnant pearl, that Jackie says makes me look like a high-end stripper and I tell him to shut his fat mouth.

He has no right and I’m not going to let him say nice things about me no matter how much I like it.

I don’t pay any attention to the way that curl of warmth slips into my stomach and reminds me, _He likes your earring_ , which shoos any of the lingering doubts I had about it (because, fine, I care about my friends’ opinions, and I don’t want to look like a girl but I still wear it, because _Mom_ ) out the window of my soul.

“Oh look,” Queenie points out loudly. “ _Lucky_ has put his phone away. The rest of us should, too, so we can have a nice afternoon where we’re all talking face-to-face and not staring at screens.”

“Yeah, ’cause everything was going so greatly before,” Bryce mutters into a pile of lo mein that his nose is almost touching. “I’ll bet anyone right now that someone’ll get kicked out before the hour’s up.”

“Please tell me there’s dessert,” Jackie says.

“Maybe there is if you _put your phone away_.”

I’ve honestly never seen something disappear so fast in my life.

“What dessert is there?” Jason asks, suddenly very interested.

“Tofu pudding,” Queenie admits, a little reluctantly.

“F—ffffudgesticks yeah,” Bryce says, shoveling food in his mouth. He picks his rapidly emptying plate up, making for the kitchen, eating the whole time. “I’ll go get. Lucky, come help.”

Which is code for, _let’s chat_.

No offense, but I don’t really want to talk to Bryce right now. I know he’s going bring up Michael. That’s all they can do: talk about Michael; that’s all they’ve been talking about, and I don’t want to think about him. Is it too much to ask to not think about him?

 _Yes_ , my brain says, and shoves a slideshow of images to the forefront: the two of us in a restaurant, across from one another, with Michael’s head tipped back with laughter, exposing the smooth column of his throat, because I’d said something funny, but I don’t remember what.

Me propped up on my elbows on a picnic blanket in the park, watching Netflix— _trying_ to watch Netflix—while he draped clusters of lilac flowers over my head, trying to get them to balance on my hair; I’d been trying to act annoyed and kept swatting them off, but when I glanced up for just a moment, there was this ridiculous soppy grin on his face that made my insides melt, so I let him do what he wanted.

Michael and I crunching through the winter snow, trying to blow clouds of white breath in each others’ faces, his black felt coat wrapped around me until I was surrounded by the smell of jasmine and tuberose.

Lying in bed in the drugging amber light of his bedroom, my head atop his chest, listening to the pounding rain outside and slow beat of his heart while he stroked my hair, tracing his fingernails over my scalp, calming me until my breath was slow enough that I fell asleep.

Showing up outside his apartment, my arms full of lilies because I wanted to take him somewhere nice that evening, and the look on his face when he’d opened the door, like he’d never gotten flowers before; nobody had ever gotten him flowers before.

 _Godfuckingdamnit_ , I snap at my brain, _can you just stop for once?_

I leave the dining room to go with Bryce even though I don’t want to, because I don’t want anyone to see the tears pricking at my eyes because, fine, I miss it, okay, _I miss it_.

I don’t feel any better, even after admitting it. Do I need to say it aloud for the catharsis to set in? Because that’s not happening—

“It’s in the refrigerator,” Queenie calls.

I hear a small scuffle, drowned out by Bryce literally inhaling the rest of his food and chucking his plate in the sink, and I assume that Queenie’s parents have gone downstairs because they’re nowhere to be found and all the things they had been washing are dried and put away, as if they’d never been used in the first place.

I yank at the fridge doors, Bryce lunging over to breathe down my neck, because the way to _his_ heart is through coagulated soy curds, and he has less patience than a mule.

He’s halfway through asking, “Can I have your portion?” since he knows I hate squishy foods, when the scuffle relocates to right outside the kitchen doors, and Michael shoves his way in, irritated, yanking his arm out of Jason’s grasp.

I freeze.

Bryce straightens up.

The two of them face off like wary bucks, not sure if they want to lock antlers or not; Jason senses the crackling tension, like lightning before it strikes, and disappears to safety. I don’t know the last time Bryce talked to Michael (not counting today’s disastrous lunch). Don’t know what their current friendship standing is. He doesn’t talk about Michael with me.

“I want to talk to Lucky,” he says.

“Tough break,” Ella says, busting into the kitchen, because she has none of Jason’s qualms (which, to be fair, are well-advised, because he’s gotten several black eyes from stepping between the two of them in the past). She insinuates herself right in front of Michael; anyone who didn’t know us would think that Michael would steamroll her, but in reality, she’d kneecap him before he took so much as a step forward. “You’re not starting any fights right now.”

“There isn’t going to be a _fight_ ,” Michael practically snarls, and I bite back the _Yeah, right_ , because I’ve seen that look on his face before, way back when we’d argue about stupid things, like him wanting all the forks and spoons in his drawers to be nestled against one another and me considering that too much work and just chucking stuff vaguely where it belonged when I went over to his place before he moved, much to his recurring annoyance; or when I snapped at him that he worked too much and he snapped back that obviously only one of us was making the money in the relationship, here, something that had made me so furious I’d stormed off and ignored him for a week until he showed up on my doorstep to apologize.

“Bullshit,” Ella says, not budging.

“Get out,” Michael orders, and I must not be the only one who sees the wrath ignite in her eyes, promising immediate, _very_ painful death for talking to her like that, because Bryce hauls ass around the refrigerator and yanks her, spitting, out of the kitchen before Michael can end up in a bathtub, his body dissolving in bleach; perhaps _Bryce_ will be the one in the bathtub after that move.

I let the refrigerator door fall shut because if I were at home, Dad would already be yelling at me for letting all the cold air out into the house.

Glare at him.

He takes a step forward.

I take a step back. “What do you want.”

Flat.

Emotionless.

I’m over him.

“I need to tell you somethi—”

“I don’t want to hear it.”

He’s frustrated, I can tell, he’s digging his hands in the mass of his hair like he’s always done when he loses patience. “Will you just _listen_?”

“No.” I try to dodge around him to flee back into the relative safety of the dining room, but he’s bigger than me, everyone’s bigger than me, and he somehow manages to corner me aside the sink.

“Lucky, please.” He’s pressing up next to me, and I can feel the heat from his skin eking through his clothes and clinging to me, and his hands are up like a little pangolin’s and he smells like jasmine, and it’s too much like how it used to be and I can’t—I can’t do this, because I’m so fucking angry and I’m so fucking sad and I want to beat his chest with my fists and ask him who the fuck he thinks he is and what the fuck he thought he was doing, because you don’t go and break someone’s heart when they give it to you, that’s not what you _do_.

“Back the _hell_ up.”

“Lucky.”

“No.” I try to slither around him, but he catches my sleeve and I have to turn around, I have to look at him, and I don’t want to look at him because I can’t—I don’t want to see that look on his face, like _I_ ’m the one who broke _his_ heart, because it hadn’t been like that at all. “Let go of me.”

“Please, just let me explain—”

“There’s nothing to explain!” I explode, rounding on him, and all the hurt comes pouring out. The other room is very, very quiet but I can’t even bring myself to care that they’re eavesdropping. “Enough was explained when I fucking walk in and see that fucking _girl_ in your bed, and maybe you should’ve had the fucking decency to at least kick her out before noon because, god knows, that’s what any normal person would do if they had a side chick!”

He flinches. “That wasn’t—”

“And I thought everything was fine!” I shout. “Because we were texting and calling and FaceTiming all the time and _you told me everything was fine_! But clearly you were lying, and you didn’t really miss me at all, because apparently all the ass in Japan is better than mine and ripe for the picking, in which case I don’t know why you just kept fucking lying and didn’t just break it off, because you know, that would’ve fucking been better! And then I got the call from my dad, when I was at the airport catching my flight back, and my mom _died_ , you fucker, she _died_ , and I could’ve been there with _her_ , instead of in that room, staring at _you_ and having my heart splinter into a million fucking pieces.

“And you know what? The whole flight back, I wasn’t even thinking about her, that’s how fucking terrible of a son I was—I-I _am_. I was thinking about _you_ , and I was thinking about _what you wanted_ and what was it that I didn’t _have_? Because I should’ve known better than to think I was the kid who got _lucky_.” I shake my head, and I know I’m smiling, this sick, twisted thing that’s curling my lips, because all of this is so fucking stupid. It’s hilarious. He’s long since reeled away, stricken, and he looks like I’ve punched him, and I haven’t even punched him no matter how much I desperately want to. “But do you want to know the best part?” I say hoarsely, and I’m not shouting anymore, because all my energy is gone, dissolved like sugar stirred too long in water, and all I want to do is curl up on the floor and cry and make everyone and everything go away so I don’t have to worry about pretending anymore. I take a deep breath; clench my teeth together so I can stop shaking. “The best part is that I don’t even have the ring to throw in your fucking face anymore.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for reading! If you've liked what you've seen so far, stick around, I'll be posting a holiday short ft. snippets from the perspective of Bryce and a mysterious stranger because I'd rather work on anything else than this, apparently


	5. I Should Like to Acquire a New Brain on Etsy, Can Someone Please Tell Me How Much It Would Cost?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I watched _Wolfwalkers_ the other weekend and I'm man enough to admit I definitely cried at least three times; the connection between Mébh and her mother is just so beautiful. I know I didn’t write a lot about Lucky and his mom together, but that’s kind of what I picture them being like: Lucky was really close with both his parents when he was younger, telling them important stuff that happened in his life and going to them when he needed reassurance; he’s struggling with all the guilt and the grief now that his mom’s gone because he’s missing one of his anchors and he doesn’t know who to turn to (he thinks his dad’s got it all figured out and that he would only be a burden now), because he thinks he’s supposed to be an adult who can deal with it all without accepting any help.  
> Anyway, that was just my take on it. Sorry for all the run-on sentences you’re about to read. I should’ve apologized for them in Chapter 1.  
> As a last note, Happy New Year! Here’s to hoping 2021 will be somewhat better than 2020

I don’t go home right away. I sit in my car, the engine going so that I can put the heat on, my arms folded on the steering wheel, my face buried in them until my sleeves are soaked.

Which is immature and killing the environment, but at this point, I can’t bring myself to care.

Someone taps on my window.

I almost don’t bother to look up.

I do anyway, because I’m not completely heartless. That stupid thing in my chest might be broken, but it’s still there, bleeding all over my stupid insides.

Stupid emotional hemorrhaging.

It’s Collie.

She’s standing ankle-deep in a snowbank, not wearing a coat, both arms wrapped around her while she shivers against a gust of cold February wind.

I unlock the doors. I’d locked them because fuck _me_ if Michael was going to follow me out into my own damn car. No, I’d left him there to get yelled at by six other people. He fucking deserved that.

She clambers into shotgun.

A brittle snatch of winter air comes in with her, freezing my tears to my skin momentarily, and then she pulls the door closed. It’s an old car, so the door slams. It’s not her fault.

She doesn’t say anything.

She turns down the heater a little bit, because it’s starting to feel like a sauna and she can’t really breathe properly in what she likes to call “artificial heat” (which I think is just an excuse for her to keep her car at zero degrees in winter ( _her_ excuse is that the heater doesn’t work anymore) and then yell at us, her usual passengers, that we’re not wearing enough layers when we complain that it’s freezing), so the noise level drops drastically and suddenly the air is full of my sniffs because my nose is plugged from crying and the tissues are in the back, too far away for me to comfortably get.

We sit there for a long time.

In silence.

I wipe my eyes viciously.

“You can’t stay here,” I say when my cheeks are finally damp instead of sopping and my eyes are swollen and raw from the remnants of too many tears. She looks at me in surprise, and I feel horrible because I know she thinks I’m kicking her out because I’m still furious, but all my anger has shriveled up and died and I just want to go home and wrap myself in my fuzzy blankets and sleep for the next thirty years. Or until I die. Or maybe I just want to die, so I don’t have to feel anything anymore; so I don’t have to _think_ anymore; so I don’t have to see his face anymore, because every time I do, I feel like I’m being gutted. “I have to go get groceries for Dad.”

I’m going to get groceries, because I promised Dad that I would, and I don’t want to think about the past two hours at all ever again in my life.

That’s what I tell myself.

I _need_ to get groceries.

I’ll go to Cub.

Everything will be alright.

I’ll be alright.

I angrily swipe away the silent tears that are welling in my eyes.

“Okay.” She reaches up and behind, and I don’t fully understand what she’s doing until her belt is clicked in place.

I blink and sniff—wipe my nose, still not quite getting it.

“Let’s go,” she says.

“What about your car?” It’s sitting forlornly in the Zhangs’ driveway, an ancient green Volkswagen that should have, by all rights, sputtered to death by now.

“I’ll come back and get it.”

I swallow thickly.

“Start the car, Lucky,” she says gently, so I put the key in the ignition and clutch the gear shift so tightly my knuckles go white. The tires skid momentarily before they find the traction to turn us out into the road, and my dumb brain finally starts working for its rent and shoves forward the memory of how I got here, so I don’t have to google it and listen to Siri’s overly-peppy voice give me instructions while I try not to have a mental breakdown.

“Him and Bryce were having it out in the living room when I left,” she says as I come to a junction, putting on my turn signal.

It clicks, lonely but stubbornly steady, in the silence.

“I don’t care.”

I take the turn. Get on the highway.

“Lucky.”

“I don’t want to talk about it.” There’s a hard edge to my voice even though I have to sniff, again. They keep bringing him up, and bringing him up, and bringing him up, and old wounds still haven’t healed over, because I’m too fond of ripping off my scabs when they itch, and they’ve been itching so, so much because the one thing I can never get out of my damned head is Michael Quentin Scott.

Because of what we’d had.

Because of what he’d done.

Oh, fuck him.

I want to start sobbing again even though that probably wouldn’t be a great idea, considering I’m currently going sixty-five miles per hour on a slick road. I glance sideways to make sure I won’t get rammed when I switch lanes, blinking back hot tears and gritting my teeth until my throat aches all the way down to my stomach, which is wrenching like I’ve been stabbed. I catch the look on Collie’s face out of the corner of my eye. She’s sad, I can tell. The cruel part of me wants to laugh hysterically and ask her why _she_ ’s the sad one; Michael hadn’t been cheating on _her_ ; _her_ mom hadn’t died while she’d been off trying to propose to who she’d thought was the love of her life.

“I’m sorry,” she says softly. “I didn’t know.”

“I know. Still don’t want to talk about it.”

“Why didn’t you tell me?”

“I—” My throat hurts _so much_ ; despite my efforts, tears are welling in my eyes.

 _Don’t cry!_ I yell at my stupid body. _In case you didn’t get the memo, I don’t want to get into a car crash!_

 _I thought you_ wanted _to die_ , my brain says. _You_ know _I can make that happen._

The thought makes me want to throw up.

“You should’ve told me,” she says. “Lucky, I should’ve _been_ there for you. That’s what best friends do.”

I shake my head, gritting my teeth to keep the tears from falling. “You were in Senegal.”

“So what? I would’ve come back for you.”

I try to stop it, but the next time I blink, a fat tear tumbles down my cheek. I shake my head again, because she shouldn’t _have_ to come back for me, she shouldn’t _have_ to be there for me all the time, we’re separate people, not conjoined twins; she has her own life and she loves it: it’s all the independence she never had as a kid, since she was always stifled by her helicopter mom, something she’d constantly lamented about. I’m not about to become Collie’s Parent, Version Two.

“I _would_ have. You stupid idiot.” She reaches over and grabs the back of my neck; I squeeze my eyes shut briefly to clear them of tears and pray I don’t kill us both because if I do, my life will be written up as a huge fucking tragedy. “Remember in tenth grade when I started dating Liam Rhett?” she asks.

I force my eyes open and nod blurrily, because I do: I’d had a crush on him too; he’d been the perfect, traditional all-American boy: blonde and blue-eyed, with perfect straight white teeth and a smile to die for. Suffice to say when he’d chosen Collie over me (not that there was any competition at all, because he was also very traditionally all-American in that he was straighter than a yardstick and didn’t even know I existed), we’d had an enormous fight out in her yard before storming back to our respective houses.

“We didn’t talk for a whole two months after that because you were so angry at me—yeah, and I was angry at you. But then I caught him screwing the volleyball captain in the unisex bathroom and showed up at your doorstep after school, blubbering my eyes out, and it was like you didn’t even care about those two months we spent apart, because you took me right in and wrapped a blanket around me and cuddled me on the couch and listened to everything I had to say.

“And that was when I _knew_ , Lucky, come hell or high water, I’d do anything to keep you as my friend, because you _cared_. You didn’t yell at me or make me feel guilty about anything, you just sat down and listened, and that was more than anyone else had ever done for me. My other friends hadn’t cared because they’d been jealous, and my parents hadn’t cared because they don’t care about that kind of thing. But you—” she pokes a finger into my arm, “—you were always there. And maybe it’s time for someone to repay the favor.”

“I don’t need anyone to take care of me,” I say, but my voice is cracking rather tellingly.

“Neither do I,” she says. “But it’s nice to just have someone there, sometimes.”

I swallow thickly.

The engine is loud, and the cars skidding by on slush are even louder, but the silence between Collie and me is taut and noticeable.

Eventually, I have to turn off the highway.

I almost miss the exit because the highway is so shittily plowed.

“You really thought he was the one, huh?” Collie asks, softly; so softly I almost don’t hear.

I jam the heel of my hand against one eye. “Yeah, well, look at where that got me.”

“I’m sorry,” she whispers, and I think her eyes might be a little wet, too.

“It’s not your fault.”

_It’s mine._

_My fault, all mine._

_If I hadn’t gone to Japan, would she still be alive? Mom, would you still be_ alive _?_

_I miss you._

_If I die, would I see you again?_

_I just want to see you again._

_I want to say good-bye._

_I didn’t get to say good-bye._

_I’m sorry._

“I’m sorry anyways,” Collie says. Her hand slides off my neck; down my shoulder and upper arm. She takes my right hand from the wheel, wrapping our fingers together. Her fingers are warm against my ice-cold skin.

I sniff, violently. Outside, the sky is the brightest blue, not a cloud in sight.

“It’s not your fault either.”

I swallow thickly.

She must understand my lack of words, because her fingers tighten momentarily on mine. “Lucky.”

“It’s fine. I’m fine. I know that.”

I know it, I understand it; I’m twenty-two, I _know_ how death works, I know it’s not controlled by some magical higher being; nothing can stop it.

But I just wanted a chance to say good-bye.

 _Ugh, snap out of it!_ I yell at myself. _What’s wrong with you? You’re always so immature! Only babies think that kind of shit._ Fuck, why am I so immature? I wasn’t so immature, I’d be doing some shit like celebrating her life instead of her death; I would’ve let her go by now.

I’d have let _him_ go by now. I’d be dating someone else; someone else who loved me more than Michael had and reminded me of all my best traits. I wouldn’t _want_ him still, and I wouldn’t be this huge fucking mess, snotting up the inside of the only car me and my dad own.

“Okay,” Collie whispers, like she understands that I’m trying to convince myself more than her, with the words.

Our hands rest together on the console, just below the gear shift, all the way to our destination. The sun shining brightly enough to blind me when I turn west into Cub’s parking lot, looking for a spot that’s close enough to the doors so Collie and I won’t slip on ice and snap our spines like a toothpicks as we dash for the sliding doors to prevent ourselves from dying of frostbite.

“You can’t run from him forever,” she says, once the car’s stopped, and I should’ve known better than to think this conversation was over. Once Collie starts something, she doesn’t stop until you give in to her wiles (“My _advice_ , Lucky!”), or until she’s been sufficiently distracted.

“I’m not running,” I mutter.

“Fine. You can’t _avoid_ him forever. You’re friends with seven people who are still friends with him; you’re going to see each other, especially since he’s moved back here.”

“He’s staying?” I ask. I ignore the swoop in my stomach and tell myself that I only want to know so that I can hide from him. So I never have to see his face again, and be reminded of _that day_.

 _He should’ve stayed in Japan_ , I think viciously. _Then I wouldn’t have the urge to brain him with my mother’s headstone._

“Xcel said they want him for their corporate counsel.”

Of course they did. Any company run by someone with a brain was drooling after Michael, because he was good at what he did. Better than good.

“And he accepted?”

She sighs, staring out the window to the empty car beside us. “He’s thinking about it. A bunch of companies are running circles trying to piss on him; I think he’s having fun sitting back and watching how much they’ll drive the others’ offers up. I swear he gets off on the power play.”

I snort, because she doesn’t know half of it. Even though, at the same time, I want to know. I want to know how she knows. Does she talk to him? Does he talk about me? Does he miss—

“You should give him a chance to apologize.”

I snap my head around to glare at her. “No.”

“Lucky—”

“No. He doesn’t deserve that. And I heard you guys in the kitchen, and I _know_ what you’re going to say next, and I don’t _care_ ,” I snap. “This isn’t a romance book, okay? Let me lay it out for you in really obvious terms, because I know you love clichés and happy endings, but here’s what’s _not_ going to happen. I’m not going to see him again. He’s not going to apologize. We are not going to get back together. Okay? Just let it go. It’s over.”

Forever.

_He wasn’t the one._

Maybe one day I’ll be able to say that without breaking down. Without _wanting_ to break down.

Maybe one day, I’ll look back on this all and laugh at how juvenile it all was.

I take a deep breath in. Try to untangle all my emotions and send the sadness off to a faraway corner, but it wants to stick to me like one of those slappy hands.

“Sorry,” mutter.

Her hand tightens in mine. “Don’t be. You don’t have to be sorry. It’s not your fault; none of it was your fault; you don’t deserve the grief that you have to life with. You don’t have to be alone, either. Let me be there for you, like you were there for me.”

The edges of Sedan I’m parked in front of start to get blurry with tears. “Don’t say that.” _You don’t need to be here for me. If you were there for me every time I’m a mess, we would be attached at the hip! You’d hate that, and you’d never get the chance to travel again. You’d be stuck here, with my sorry ass, in Minnesota, and then we’d_ both _go nowhere with our lives._

“Oh, Lucky.”

The next thing I know, she’s unbuckling her belt and leaning over, wrapping me in her thin arms, and no matter how bony Collie Lin is, her hugs are one the best things on Earth. I bury my nose in her collarbone and try not to weep too hard, because a person can only stand to get so much snot on them before they pry you off in disgust.

“I’m sorry,” she whispers in my ear, her hair tickling my skin, both the softness of it and the thick smell of sweet shampoo making my nose itch.

“’Snot your fault,” I manage to eke out as I try to figure out how to stop sobbing in the middle of a suburban Cub Foods parking lot.

_Why had there been a girl in his bed?_

_Why had he cheated on me?_

_I thought he’d loved me!_

_Why hadn’t he been able to be there for me when I needed him most?_

This thought makes me cry harder than all the rest.

Why hadn’t he been there for me? I’d trusted him; why hadn’t he _been_ there?

“I’m here,” Collie whispers. She rubs my back until I force myself to pull away because I start getting paranoid that she doesn’t really want to be hugging me for forever, especially while she’s half-stretched over the transmission.

“Ugh.” I let my forehead fall onto the steering wheel, squeezing my eyes shut so hard they ache and tears drip down the gray plastic. “I’m so _tired_ , Collie.” My stomach’s all twisted up inside, like my body can’t bother to keep all the hurt in my brain; instead, it has to spread it to my organs, too.

“I know, bud.” She fastens a hand on the back of my neck and I try to imagine that it’s a tether, pulling me back down to real life; pulling me back down to this parking lot, so I can get ahold of myself and then go into Cub so I can get groceries, because I’m here for a _reason_ , not just to cry in a place other than outside Queenie’s house. “Let me help you."

“You can’t.”

“Lucky.” She sounds sad at that—so sad—that I can’t help but to feel horrible.

“Sorry,” I choke out. “I didn’t mean that. I…”

“It’s fine. I get it. Seriously. But I mean it. Anytime you need me, I’ll be here. You can tell me anything, you know that, right? We’re best friends.”

I nod, throat clenching painfully, my head still on the wheel. When I can finally open my mouth without sobbing like a loser, I inhale a huge, stuttering breath. Scrub my eyes again with my still-damp sleeves.

“Fuck. I’m going to turn Dad’s car into an ocean. Like Alice in _Alice in Wonderland_.”

She snorts. “I don’t think you’ve got that many tears in you.”

“Try me.”

“Well,” she says, teacher voice in effect. “Logically, we know that tears come from the water in your body. Therefore, we can assume that says your body is, _at the absolute most_ , one hundred percent water. Now, we know this isn’t true, but remember: it’s a hypothetical upper limit. And you, my friend, are not as big as an ocean. Ergo, you could not hold enough water to cry an ocean.”

“Shut up,” I tell her, but when I glance over, I’m grinning. It’s a watery expression, and I’m still not feeling much better, but it’s easier to ignore your pain when you’re smiling.

She huffs a laugh. “You’re just mad that I’m right.”

“Never.”

“You want to know another thing I’m right about?” She’s got a glint in her eye that I don’t like.

“If this is about Michael some more, I don’t want to hear it,” I mumble, yanking the keys out of the ignition. “Okay? I’m over it. I’m _so_ over it. Also!” I point a finger at her and try to muster an angry expression. “I’m mad at you, too! Don’t try and worm your way back into my good graces. You’re the one who invited him.”

Chagrin slides onto her face. Good thing it does, because if I hadn’t seen it make an appearance, I wouldn’t have forgiven her, because she’s never actually sorry unless that look appears.

“I’m sorry,” she says. “I really am. I didn’t know. The last call was all fucked up. You know nobody likes using the group chat anymore because…” _…censoring stuff got difficult, especially when we were talking about group activities, and Michael was trying to be on those first few group calls to try and talk to you after the…_ incident _, and we didn’t want to create two group chats and have to repeat nearly everything in both of them._

It was just another thing the gang had given up, for me. I’m a little disgusted by myself, being so immature that I can’t properly ignore his existence to go on living a normal life.

“Okay,” I say. Look out the window.

“Wow.” She tries to muster a voice of cheerfulness, but it falls a little flat. “I must be getting better at apologizing and making excuses if I’ve got you forgiving me already.”

I shrug and open the car door. A blast of cold air hits me in the face, completely obliterating my sauna and freezing my damp cheeks, and I very seriously consider closing my door and just staying in my car forever until I die. Too late, though: Collie’s opening her door, too, and so I have to follow her out. We hustle through the snowy parking lot, shoulder-to-shoulder, nearly getting run over by a van that blares its horn at us. I almost flip off the driver before I remember that I am very small and very crushable and don’t want to be roadkill outside a grocery store in a slightly seedy neighbor. I may be suicidal, but I need to go out with _style_.

“I think you should let him apologize,” she says as I grab a cart. “Seriously. Just to get it over with.”

“For what?” I laugh bitterly. “The closure?”

“Yeah. I know you hate him. Maybe after the apology, you’ll feel better. You can make him grovel a bit. Or a lot. However much the situation deserves.”

I don’t say that I don’t think there’s any situation where there could possibly be _enough_ groveling on his part. “Or maybe, after, I’ll still want to bend his spine like a pipe cleaner.”

“Maybe,” she admits. “Everyone would probably let you. _He_ ’d probably let you. He’d let you do anything.”

I snort while she attacks the produce section of the store, beelining straight for the kale, as if this is her shopping trip and not mine. “Right,” I say. “Well, maybe I want to murder him. Would he let me do that?” Then I remember we’re in a Cub Foods, with security cameras all over the place, and I say, out loud, “Ha-ha, that was a joke. By the way.” In case the FBI are watching, you know.

Collie looks at me weird from her kale search until she catches on and shoots an amused glance at the ceiling. A woman who’s next to me, picking through broccoli, glances at me like I might be a serial killer and edges away, and self-consciousness immediately sweeps over me.

 _You’re doing such a great job keeping your mouth shut_ , my brain snorts. _Open it up some more, maybe Michael will take the free invitation and stick his dick in there._

“Shut up,” I hiss to myself, ignoring the wave of nausea that thought brings and bagging a head of broccoli and tossing it more violently than necessary into the cart, garnering another weird look from Collie. She doesn’t ask, though. Just one more reason why she’s my best friend: she ignores all my psychosis when it needs to be ignored. “I thought we came here for _me_ to shop,” I grumble as she vetoes the kale and goes to inspect the collard greens instead, with an eye that would be more suited to a prison lineup than the produce section of Cub Foods.

“Well, I figured if we were here already, I could just do some shopping, too, and save myself some time, later.” She grins innocently while deeming the collard greens unsatisfactory, moving on quickly to rainbow Swiss chard, which is disappointingly non-rainbow and mostly just green and red.

It’s probably to make that disgusting vegetarian soup that her mom used to make her all the time when she was a kid. I’d always thought it was gross when I went over (an opinion I kept to myself because one did _not_ slander the host’s food and ever expect to be invited back), but Collie has always been a stickler for “good memories,” though I can’t possibly know how chewing on bland greens in water can invoke good memories. For _me_ , good memories are my parents picking me up from school on Fridays and making a detour to Oriental Foods on the way back home for the sole purpose of letting me get a box of Pocky or the little panda crackers filled with chocolate or strawberry cream.

It had been a tiny attempt for me to be as “ethnic” as my very few Asian friends from middle school, but now I just feel stupid and out-of-place when I go into a Chinese grocery store, because I’ve got to be the whitest Chinese person ever to live. I can’t even go back to the tiny comfort of Oriental Foods, because they closed down a couple of years back.

 _Yeah, you can barely even cook for yourself, can you? Pathetic_ , says my brain. _You’re literally the most Caucasian person out of all your friends. Why do they even want to hang out with you? They should leave you alone. Like Mom did._

 _Shut up_ , I tell it, trying to busy myself by attacking lemons, because I have no other retort. Why _do_ they put up with me? Did Mom think I was so weird that she died to be rid of me?

Thankfully I’m distracted from thinking about _that_ by Collie wrestling a bunch of her chard into a green plastic bag and not bothering to tie it up with a twisty tie before she dumps it in my cart.

“This is _my_ cart,” I point out uselessly as her chard sheds water all over my groceries.

“Be a dear,” she says in response, and I don’t reply because I don’t _really_ mind pushing around her junk.

“I don’t understand why you like that stuff,” I mutter as she wanders over past the cereals into the deli section, my hands on my phone so I can text Dad and ask what kind of chicken he wants.

The “chicken bread” is still haunting me. I guess it’s a pathetic attempt for the rational part of my brain to ignore the existence of Michael Quentin Scott, and a memory from way back when in college when one of my ex-friends had had a profile picture on their school email of a pug merged with a loaf of bread. Is that what a chicken bread would look like? But with a chicken instead of a pug? Also, ‘chicken’ isn’t super descriptive. Would it be a hen or a rooster? Because they look different—it’s an important distinction.

 _Cock is another name for rooster_ , the non-rational part of my brain says unhelpfully. _Michael has a cock._

 _Shut the fuck up_ , I snap at it.

It laughs at me.

Stupid brain.

My phone buzzes with a text message, and whether this is related or not, the battery percentage drops from forty-two percent to thirty-three in point-five seconds.

I sigh.

Great. It’ll probably go dead within the next fifteen minutes, because the screen has the tendency to go black even when the battery says it’s still at twenty percent. At the risk of sounding terrifyingly emo, it’s like nothing ever goes right in my life.

“What’re we getting from here?” Collie asks, looking at fleshy Oscar Mayer bologna.

“Don’t buy that,” I tell her. “That stuff’s so gross.”

“Listen,” she says, unhooking a pack, “you learn to appreciate in adulthood the things that your parents never let you have as a child.”

I know she means her mom, who’s half-crazy: a really paranoid Romanian immigrant who believes in stuff like blood type diets and all that crap who makes me wonder, every time I see her, how Collie even survived through childhood; she was probably only saved by her father taking her out to parades and letting her scuttle over and nab candy off the street like a starved demon, and then eat all of said candy in the car on the way back home. Her father’s cool—he’s Taiwanese and he makes the best wonton soup that I’ve ever eaten. He’s also the reason Collie got to go to a public high school after graduating from the tiny-ass private school that she had gone to from ages four to fourteen. She’d latched onto me like a squid at freshman orientation and never let go.

Thank goodness for that.

I don’t know where I’d be without her and, considering her childhood, she’s not as weird as I thought she’d turn out. I might even go so far as to say _I_ ’m the weirder one out of the two of us.

“It’s so salty,” I say. “And it tastes like death.”

Collie makes a face at the Oscar Mayer offerings. “You’re just like my mother. I’d bet you’d shop at Whole Foods all the time if you could.”

I roll my eyes and hook my foot on the bottom of the shopping cart, starting to rock back and forth again.

“Go get your chicken, dude,” she tells me. “I’ll be right here. You know I never wander off.”

I shoot her a momentary grateful smile that I don’t think she catches. Given my absolutely tiny size, it’s too easy to get separated from company in stores, and I hate having to go up to the counter to ask the person there to announce the fact that I am lost over the speakers. That’s humiliating to no end, and has happened far too many times.

Collie stays where she is, though, and I get my dad’s chicken.

 _Why are you bagging it weird, Lucky?_ my brain asks, while I do so. _Can’t you do_ anything _normally? Look at that fat dude over there. He’s staring at you weird._

I glance over just as the aforementioned man looks away, so I see absolutely nothing about the way he’d been looking at me, but my brain fills the empty space with detailed descriptions of disgust and, insecure, I flee back to Collie’s safety before _more_ people can ask me what I’m doing. Which is probably more than pathetic: being a grown man stressing out over whether or not I _bagged chicken right_.

Collie drags me out of the deli, then—past the bakery, while I shoot a longingly glance at doughnuts and cupcakes I’m not going to buy—and into the frozen section.

“You’re moving too fast,” I moan as she zips past the yogurts, tossing my dad’s cheese into the cart while I try to do quick math in my head to figure out the bill before we get to check-out, because I’d been so excited about seeing a bunch of my conniving friends again that I hadn’t really thought about the negative consequences of throwing two-hundred-plus dollars down the drain, and I’m going to pay for it now. Tragically, my brain is soup, courtesy of my stupid emotions, and I’ve never been skilled at math even on a good day.

“You’re moving too slow,” she counters, already turning into the next aisle. As I make to follow her, my eye catches on the cottage cheese, and memory flashes across my mind. Me, younger, in the kitchen with its yellow linoleum floor, holding a bowl of cottage cheese up and out; my mom dumping in a big spoonful of nutritional yeast on top, a huge grin on her face. I’d always eat it without mixing it up and, without fail, the first spoonful would always lead to a solid chunk of yeast getting stuck to the roof of my mouth; we would laugh as I tried to tongue it out, speaking like I had a mouthful of peanut butter.

I can _see_ her, for a second, in Cub, in front of the cottage cheese.

_Mom—_

But then I blink and she’s gone.

The aisle’s empty.

“Lucky?” Collie’s voice wafts in from the aisle over, and I swallow thickly and force myself to tear my gaze away, slumping over the cart and shoving it after her. The second I see her, she’s dumping several sacks of pizza rolls in my cart.

She’s at the side of the cart, not opposite me at the end, but she must see something, because she drops the rest of the bags and kind of leans over, trying to look at my face.

“What’s up?”

“Nothing.”

She straightens up and gives me her school-teacher look: arms crossed, eyes narrowed and chin slightly down, so she can glare at me from underneath her brows.

“Nothing,” I repeat, and it’s absolutely _not_ weaker this time.

 _No breakdowns at Cub Foods_ , I remind myself. _No breakdowns at Cub Foods_. _It wasn’t Mom. No breakdowns at Cub Foods._

“Don’t lie to me, M & M,” she says softly.

“I’m not.” I turn my head so she can’t see my face, looking unseeingly past glass doors to see frozen pizzas and burritos.

She purses her lips but seems to understand that she’s not going to get anything more out of me, because she wanders off down the aisle, takes something out from one of the freezers, and then comes back to the cart, into which she dumps a tub of ice cream.

“Here,” she says. “For you.”

“I’m not getting that,” I protest weakly.

“Oh yes, because you want to go home and cry _without_ ice cream? That’s twice as sad, and then you’ll be crying twice as much, because you won’t have ice cream.”

“I’m not going to go home and _cry_.”

“Lucky,” she says gently.

“I’m _not_!”

“You literally have the abandoned-puppy-in-a-shelter eyes right now. I’m not looking at you, because if I look at you for more than five seconds, _I_ ’m going to cry, and I’m only not making you talk about it because you…” she waves her hand vaguely in my direction.

I scowl at her. What does _that_ mean?

“Now you look like and abandoned puppy that’s mildly irritated because someone keeps taking your favorite toy. I think I’m obligated to give you credit for trying, though.”

“Queenie called me a grim reaper,” I mutter, glancing away. “I’m scary. I’m badass.”

Collie pats my arm. “You keep telling yourself that, M & M.”

I roll my eyes, because she only calls me that when she’s trying to make a point about how “small” and “adorable” I am, like she’s not only three inches taller than me. Seriously, I’d think that being short and being Asian went together, if I hadn’t been introduced to all of Michael’s giant friends, so maybe it’s just a me-and-Collie thing.

I don’t know.

“I can’t,” I mutter to Collie instead of letting those unsubstantiated and irrelevant words fall out of my mouth in the middle of the frozen section. “It’s five bucks.”

Collie looks at Ben & Jerry’s pint of The Tonight Dough.

Jimmy Fallon’s face grins up at her without a care in the world.

“It’s four eighty-nine,” she says carefully.

It’s not that I’m broke, it’s just that…

“I don’t _need_ it, Collie.” And there are better things for me to spend my money on.

 _Like kitsch that your friends won’t even appreciate?_ my brain inquires, then laughs when I mentally flip it off, trying to get that thought out of my head, because they’d seemed so _happy_ to get their gifts, and I don’t want to consider the fact that they might’ve just been pretending so as not to hurt my feelings. They wouldn’t have been pretending, right? They wouldn’t do that to me. We’ve known each other for years now.

Collie looks at me, and I’m more than prepared to argue about the ice cream—I have like five arguments that I can use off the top of my head (all of which completely ignore the fact that I fucking love ice cream) starting with lactose intolerance and ending with the fact that I am technically four pounds heavier than the Hamwi Method of body weight measurement says I should be, as a twenty-two-year-old man who is five feet and two-and-a-half inches tall (because fine, so I still haven’t gotten the kind of Bruce-Lee-cheese-grater/washboard abs that I’m pretty sure _every_ man wants)—and if _those_ arguments fail, which they would never because I am _fantastic_ at arguing, I can always put the ice cream back when she’s not looking. She must see something in my face, though, because she just goes, “Fine. It’s for me, then; and I’ll pay for it. You know, since it’s for me. I’ll give you a measly penny for pushing it around.” She gives me an innocent smile.

“That means it’s _yours_ ,” I say. “You’re not going to, like, leave it in my car.” The words come out halfway between question and statement.

“That is correct, O Captain, my Captain.”

“Nobody likes your Walt Whitman references,” I mutter, still not entirely convinced, because Collie has been doing that kind of thing since we first became friends.

“You do, you nerdy-ass almost-English-major.”

I swallow down the knot in my throat at that jibe. Not that she meant it as a jibe. She probably was just stating facts—or what was facts, for her. She’s already wandering down the remainder of the frozen aisle, staring down the ice cream bars that wag their tongues at her from behind the glass doors—she’s always had a murderous sweet tooth, so I guess it _is_ likely that she’d take the ice cream for herself. (She’d better. I’ll drive over to her house and hand it over to her myself if she leaves it in my car.)

She probably doesn’t know that I dropped out.

It’s not that I _lied_ about it, per se.

I just haven’t… brought it up. They still ask me, every once in a while, how university's going, because I’d done horribly enough in three years there that my advisor had told me I’d be graduating in five, and I just lie about it because I know as soon as everyone finds out, it’s going to blow up into this huge _thing_ , and that’s the last thing I want—it’s not a big deal. I still have no idea how to deal with the fact that they're all going to demand to come to my nonexistent graduation, so I'm just ignoring that for the time being. It's an issue for Future Lucky to figure out, because at the moment, Present Lucky is still agonizing over the decision I'd made. It was just… at the time, I’d had a lot of other stuff on my mind (Mom) (stupid Michael) (more Mom) and I hadn’t understood—I _still_ don’t understand—why it had so important to pay fifteen thousand dollars every semester for classes I didn’t want to take—why the hell did I need to study a language _other_ than English if I was going to be majoring in English, and why the double hell did I need to take _calculus_ —even after I’d switched my major to graphic art, and then to comic art…?

Maybe I should’ve gone to MCAD instead, but when I toured there, all the rooms were horrible: half of them had chairs that stood a solid four feet above the ground, and the other half were claustrophobically underground and walled with concrete.

Anyway, I didn’t go to MCAD. So it doesn’t matter. The whole thing’s still a mess.

Like my life.

I guess it’s fitting that Michael should come back and just add to that.

I huff out a sarcastic laugh, and my eyes go back to the ice cream in the cart as Collie wanders into the snack aisle.

Jimmy Fallon is still smiling.

I want to ask him what’s so great about _his_ life that he can grin so widely—so ear-to-ear—like that, but then I remember that his net worth is sixty million dollars, and mine’s probably something like negative forty thousand because of student debt.

Sad.

I want to pull a face but don’t, because my brain yells at me that we’re in public and I need to stop embarrassing us.

Gradually, we pass the bread and canned goods. When we make our way to the check-out, Collie goes and grabs approximately twenty tons of shredded Colby Jack along the way, because she’s suddenly acquired a “craving” in the five minutes since we’ve last passed the dairy section, and I almost ask her if she’s pregnant, just to see if it’ll get a laugh, because she hasn’t said anything since getting the ice cream and maybe she hates me now? Because I didn’t tell her what I was upset about? Either way, she probably thinks I’m weird for freaking out over a five-dollar pint of ice cream; she’s probably going to ask what’s up with that, soon, and I don’t have any excuses prepared, but I _can’t_ tell her about it, it’s a matter of _pride_.

How can Collie even put up with me? I’m such a liar about everything.

It’s not like I’m immensely ungrateful: I’m way grateful.

She’s my only friend.

Well, not _only_ , but…

Michael’s back.

And if Michael’s back, that means his friends are all going go back to him.

And they won’t care about me anymore.

I know this isn’t how things work in real life, but I can’t help but to worry. It felt even when we were all equally as far away from each other, but now…

Now I don’t know what’s going to happen.

The miserableness of unknown fate.

It’s what I’ll name my next drawing if I can bother getting around to drawing it.

Collie kicks my ankle and I shove the cart forward toward the nightmarish checkout. _I_ wanted to do self-check-out, but _she_ wanted to read the tabloids ( _Collie_ , I want to say, _nobody_ cares _about twenty new ways to lose weight without losing your butt, and you don’t even need that anyway because you’re a twig_ , but I keep it to myself because I don’t want to make her _more_ pissed at me) so we end up in the line of this old cashier who’s as short as we are and who has dyed red hair and an accent that sounds like Collie’s mom’s and a perpetual scowl on her face, like the grocery conglomerate has done her some heinous wrong and for that reason, she wakes up every day and paints her eyebrows on in permanent anger.

It takes her a long time to realize that we’ve got separate items, and then it’s a scramble to put a separator between our stuff while the check-out lady glares at us like we’ve murdered her spouse or something.

It’s terrifying.

It makes me want to go find the bathroom just so I can go cower in one of the stalls (preferably the handicapped one because god knows there isn’t enough fucking space to even turn around in one of the standard ones, because apparently the designers didn’t think about the fact that if the door scrapes the toilet, people can’t get in and out of there without doing some advanced calisthenics) but tragically that’s not an option because I’ve got to pay for my stuff, and I start praying to baby Jesus when I stick my card into the chip machine, because I don’t want the humiliation of it getting declined.

 _Shouldn’t have bought that shit for your ‘friends_ , _’_ my brain says in a sing-song.

_Shut up._

_Seriously, though, like, think about it. Do they need all that crap? They’re probably just going to chuck it all out as soon as they get home so the junk doesn’t clutter up their space. Ugh, you’re such a bad friend you couldn’t even get them something they actually_ wanted _, you just made guesses!_

The cashier lady interrupts my thoughts (thank god), snapping at me to take out my card; and the payment terminal is beeping and telling me the transaction is over, it went through; the people over in the next lane over are shouting at the cashier; someone rolls their cart by and the kid swings on the handle, sending the thing careening sideways for a moment and wheels screech against the floor. Then Collie is telling me to take out my card, too, like I can’t understand the woman in front of me, and her voice sounds like she _might_ be irritated, but I hate that I can’t tell for sure; and some employee walks by and his walkie-talkie is squealing, like he doesn’t have it off properly; the plastic bags are screaming as the lady shoves my stuff in them; it’s loud, it’s too loud, and maybe the cashier lady is mad at me too? Her movements are all jerky and stiff, and she’s not looking at me, and her shoulders are hunched, and I’m terrified that she’s going to start yelling.

I yank my card out of the machine. Take the bags when she holds them out with this meek little “Thank you,” that’s barely there, like my voice has decided to desert me, too (my brain laughs mockingly, like I deserve this), and she doesn’t even say anything to me, just moves on to Collie’s stuff and starts treating it just as violently, and Oh, the cashier has _got_ to be mad at me, what did I do?

Collie goes, “Lucky?”

“Yeah, what, what?” I’m hovering at the end of the lane, with my cart, because it’s _my_ cart, right, and I need to go take care of it, because it’s kind of in the way right here—a couple has to skirt way to the side to avoid me, and I want to apologize to them, but they’re not even looking at me, because who would ever look at me, I’m a fucking disaster, but I can’t go put the cart away, because the cart corrals are pretty far away, like a thirty-nine-second walk at a moderate pace at least, and if I leave Collie here, she might disappear, too; she’d leave me here at Cub and fuck off to… to somewhere, because she probably can’t even stand the sight of my face anymore, I’m such a horrible friend, but even though I’m such a horrible friend I don’t want her to leave me here alone with the angry cashier, and if I leave I’m going to get lost or something and then Collie’s going to get more pissed at me because she’s going to have go up to Customer Services and ask the lady there to page me like I’m a five-year-old that’s lost their mom at Walmart, but I’m not like that, I don’t even have a mom anymore and I hate Walmart.

I feel tears prick at the corners of my eyes and I’m _mortified_. Oh my god, am I a _child_? Am I going to seriously start crying in a _public place_?

“Hey, dude,” Collie says, and then she’s holding my hand in hers, and why’s she doing that, people are going to think we’re a _couple_ , and Collie hates it when people assume things about her, she gets all snippy. “Go ahead to the car, would you? I’m gonna get a lottery, and I want the car, like, super-warm when I get there.”

“Okay, cool. Cool. Yeah.”

 _Gotta get the car warm for Collie_ , I tell myself as I force my locked-tight muscles to move, nearly pulling the cart into a tiny child I don’t even see until the last minute, and the kid’s parent scowls at me and I gasp out, “Sorry!” and try to flee, only it’s really hard to flee when you’ve got to pull a Cub Foods shopping cart with a sticky wheel behind you, I don’t know if you’ve ever tried.

 _Gotta warm the car for Collie_ , I think, and that’s what keeps me going: Gotta warm the car for Collie, because that’s the least she deserves, because she followed me out here without her coat, because I’d been a selfish bitch who’d just _left_ brunch like an asshole, and everyone was probably mad at me since I was the one to cock up the whole afternoon just because I’d had some bad reaction to seeing my ex again; did other people act like that when they saw their exes? Probably not; they probably laugh and hold up their middle fingers and drink Piña coladas and post on Snapchat about how great their life has been since they lost a hundred and eighty pounds in one afternoon.

I push the cart in to meet its brethren in the corral, and I have to shove really hard until it penetrates the back part of the cart in front of it and settles in, and I swear to god that nobody _else_ has to put such effort into such a mundane task, I’m sure the man who comes in right then is looking at me weird for it, so I just put my gaze on the floor and hightail it out of there, forgetting about the cold and almost slipping on the sleek, tramped-down snow in front of the doors and killing myself.

_At least it would be a freedom from this torture._

_Stop!_ I cry at my brain. _Stop already, just stop!_

Somehow I manage to get to the car without any further casualties and I chuck the groceries in the trunk, before I get in the car and turn it on and put the heat on high blast and then I realize I hadn’t put the groceries in the plastic crate we keep in the back specifically so the groceries don’t bang around, so I get back out of the car and leave the door open, but maybe that’s going to kill the battery, so I close the door, and then I panic because what if I’ve accidentally locked the door in that time? But when I open it, it’s unlocked, so then I close it again, and then I realize I actually need to open the truck to check on the stuff that’s _in_ the trunk, so I have to open the door _again_ and bend over to get to the lever under the seat, and the trunk _finally_ pops open, and when I go back there, the groceries are already in the plastic crate, and I’m sure I’m losing my mind. I just stand there for a second, a bit wild-eyed, puffing out cold breaths that the wind blows back into my face, and then I realize I’m standing outside without a proper coat—like, after three minutes—and slam the trunk shut and go to sit in the car again.

The car is warmer, so I thaw pretty quickly, and then I turn the heater down a little bit because it’s really loud and now it’s getting kind of hot and Collie doesn’t really like _hot_ , I can barely believe that she’d asked for it to be warm, she likes to freeze in her car, maybe I’d heard her wrong? Was she going to be mad when she got in? Should I turn on the AC?

I’m halfway to fiddling with the dial when Collie bangs on the trunk for me to open up, and I jump so hard I almost hit my head on the roof, which sounds like it should be impossible considering my height (or lack thereof) but I assure you it very much is not.

The banging sounded angry, and now dread is pooling in the bottom of my stomach and I’m kind of frozen on the seat of the car, staring ahead, dead-eyed, like a deer frozen in headlights, when Collie comes in and plops down in shotgun.

“Hey, dude,” she says. “What’s up?”

“Nothing,” I say quickly. Too quickly, probably, but now I’m scrambling to buckle up and start the car properly and get my foot on the pedal because she probably wants to get back to Queenie’s place and her car, right, so she can get away from me?

Right?

Fuck, I fucked it up, I fuck everything up. I fucked up with Michael and I fucked up with Mom and I…

Collie’s hand falls on the back of my neck and squeezes; I just barely realize there’s a tear tumbling out of my eye to skid down my cheek. “Hey, Lucky. Lucky, wait for a sec.” My foot’s solidly on the brake so that I can move the gearshift, but she puts her other hand over mine and shoves it back into park and then practically climbs over the console so that she’s half on top of me and half squeezed onto the driver’s seat, her arms wrapped around my neck and our cheeks pressed together.

“Hey, Lucky,” she says, an actual tone of worry in her voice, because she’s _worried_ about me now, and then I’m wheezing out “I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’m sorry,” and I must sound so pathetically pitiful to her.

I’m sorry about making her forget her coat.

I’m sorry for not telling her about Mom.

About Michael.

I’m sorry about the ice cream.

I’m sorry about the divider on the conveyer belt.

Sorry about the heat.

I think I manage to blubber all of that out, even though there’s way too much saliva in my mouth and my throat hurts and tongue is fat and heavy; nothing’s working the way I want it too. I feel like I’m being crushed under this enormous weight on my chest, stopping me from breathing. Maybe I ask, “Do you hate me?” too, but I’m not too sure because everything’s a mess of snot and tears and this is like, the third time I’ve cried in this car just today, and why am I so _weak_? What’s _wrong_ with me?

“I don’t care about any of that,” Collie is saying fiercely, a bright-burning flame even when she’s comforting me, but it takes way longer than it should for me to start breathing normally and to stop ugly-crying all over the inside of my Corolla.

When I hiccup, she’s still plastered all over me, and I have to drag a hand out from under our pressed-together stomachs so I can scrub at my eyes way harder than I probably should, but the pain’s grounding. Not in a masochistic way, but in the kind of way that reminds me that I have a physical body, and oh yeah, I’m in a Cub Foods parking lot and the car next to me has pulled out at some point during my breakdown and somebody else is pulling in right now, and they’re probably going to peek through the window because my car is too old to have tinted windows and every stranger is going to see me crying, and everyone’s going to know that I, Lucky Sommers, am too emotional to be a functional man.

“Breathe, dude,” Collie says, and I force myself to drag in the most stuttered breath in the history of breaths, and it almost hurts my throat to do so, the way it wants to close up and keep me from breathing at all, like my brain wants me to kill myself, the weight on my chest getting heavier.

 _Do it yourself, coward_ , I want to shout at it, _if you want me dead so bad! I refuse to do your dirty work for you!_

My brain chuckles, _We’ll see_ , which isn’t helpful.

“Breathe out,” says Collie.

I think I do that.

I think there’s more breathing, because I don’t keel over and die even though I’m going kind of numb and my eyes keep closing and I don’t really know if my body is functioning properly at all. Maybe I’m falling apart? Maybe I’m not even a human, just a robot, like the one in _A.I. Artificial Intelligence_ , but instead of malfunctioning because I’ve eaten spinach, it’s because I’ve cried every single liquid out of my body.

I don’t know.

My nose is leaking, but the tissues are way in the back, and Collie’s on my lap, and I don’t want to disturb her by asking her to get up—

She must hear me starting to get all worked up again, because she hugs me tighter and whispers in my ear that everything’s fine, she’s not the least bit angry, she doesn’t know where I got such a silly idea. She leans over into the backseat, almost kneeing me in the balls, and hauls over the tissues, and she says she’s not even so much as allowing me to _think_ about driving until I blow my nose until it’s Rudolph-red, and since I have to inhale to blow my nose, that probably helps with the breathing, too.

Who knew something so vital could be so hard, but my throat feels like it’s all clogged up and my heart feels like it’s pumping tacks instead of blood and my eyes are still watering, too puffy and red and sensitive.

“It’s okay,” she says, and she’s rubbing my back, and I can’t tell her that I don’t think it’ll be okay ever again. I _know_ this is just a moment in time. It’ll come to pass. But while I’m right here, right now, barely managing to hiccup in oxygen, I feel like I might die, and that might not be a terrible thing, because how am I expected to _live_? I can never show my face at this Cub Foods again. And obviously I hadn’t even been _thinking_ when I drove here, because now I’m going to have to drive Collie all the way back to Queenie’s parents’ house because that’s where her _car_ is and she can’t just go straight home now because her car’s going to be stuck at someone else’s house, and did I even have a _brain_?

Collie thumps me on the back and I heave another stuttered breath in.

“I’m fine,” I manage as soon as my vocal cords start working again. My voice is hoarser than I would’ve liked to admit.

“Right,” says Collie. “I don’t believe that.”

She’s so blunt about it—so flat—that I can’t help but to huff out a little breath of laughter, though it isn’t really voluntary, or relevant, because I still feel like shit.

“Here,” Collie says, and hands me another Kleenex for my leaking nose.

I sniff violently, determined to keep my snot where it should be, but it must not work because she just gives a _look_ until I blow my nose and add the crumpled-up tissue to its growing brethren in the cupholders.

“Why don’t _I_ drive?” says Collie gently. “Okay? Go clamber into the passenger seat.”

“But we have to go back to Queenie’s place,” I say, my words watery. I scrub at my eyes viciously, but I don’t know what else to do: I don’t keep cold spoons in my car for the sole purpose of putting them over my eyes after I’ve cried so that it looks like I haven’t. I’m just going to have to hide myself in the car for a couple of hours before I go back home so I don’t enter the house and Dad doesn’t start asking me why it looks like someone has pepper sprayed me.

“That’s fine,” Collie says. “I’ll drive us back to Queenie’s place to fetch my car, and then when you’ve calmed down—and only then—I will allow you to drive back home.”

“I’m calm,” I say as she lets me up to climb over the console to shotgun.

“You just bawled your guts out and apologized for _me_ buying ice cream,” Collie says.

I don’t meet her eyes.

She puts her hand on the back of my neck after I’ve buckled up, having properly insinuated herself in the driver’s seat.

“I’m fine,” I say again, even though I don’t feel like it: I just have to stuff those stupid emotions away, and then I’ll be all good again. Everything will be alright.

 _Nothing will be alright ever again_ , my brain yells at me. _Mom’s_ dead _! Michael’s back in town! How is_ anything _going to be alright?_

I ignore it. Just barely.

Why is it so hard to ignore my own brain?

“Are you seeing anyone?” Collie asks, totally at random.

“What? You know I’m not,” I say. Miserably.

 _You could be—_ says my brain before I drop-kick it out of my ear.

“Okay,” she says. “Because I really think you could benefit from going to a therapist—”

“Not this again!”

“Seriously, Lucky.” She turns on the car and checks over her shoulder before backing out of the parking space, and even though she’s careful, we nearly get taken out by an enormous black Chevy Silverado because people here have no manners. The dude lays onto the horn like it’s his last day alive and Collie must’ve been taking some lessons from Ella because she rolls down the window—she _rolls down the window_ —just to give this guy the finger and then speeds away, our tires skidding on the snow, before he can run us down for real.

“Have you gone _insane_?” I shriek at her as we book it out of the parking lot, nearly killing three pedestrians (not because Collie’s a bad driver, but because the state of this parking lot is in worse shape than one of Saturn’s moons). I look over my shoulder; thank god the Silverado isn’t following us, content instead with stealing our parking space.

“This is the United States of America, Lucky,” Collie says. “He couldn’t have run us over without being taken down in a court of law.”

“What show have _you_ been watching?”

“I haven’t been watching any show,” Collie says. “I have just come to the realization that I resent entitled Americans. It’s a side effect of living outside of the States for a while.”

I stare at her, not really sure what to think about that.

“ _You_ ’re not entitled,” she adds to that, glancing at me for a second, like she thinks I’m going to get offended or sad again. I turn away and look out the window to hide my face because that makes me feel a whole slew of different emotions. Like, yeah, great, I’m not entitled, but does she know the reason I’m not entitled is because my checking account contents are in the triple digits (not counting cents), or is she just saying that because she’s my friend? She doesn’t know about the bank account thing, right? Dad wouldn’t have told her?

I’m too scared to ask, because I don’t want to bring it up, because I’d know she’d want to talk about it far more than I would.

“Okay,” I just say quietly. Accept it like a brand. Maybe I should get _Not Entitled_ tattooed on my forehead, though that would probably come back to bite me in the ass when I’ll inevitably have to apply for a position at Target once Dad gets fed up with me with living off his 401(k). Retail, I’ve heard, does not like hiring people with tattoos. Up to seventy-seven percent of employers may be less likely to hire you if you have tattoos.

 _Thanks for the irrelevant information_ , I tell my brain.

 _You’re so welcome_ , it tells me. _I was wondering when I was going to get some appreciation around here._

Clearly my subconscious doesn’t understand sarcasm.

It finally falls silent, though, and everyone’s quiet the whole way back to Queenie’s place. Eventually I stop sniffing like a drug dog and start breathing normally, which is nice, and I wonder how much I’ll have to bribe Collie not to whisper a word of this to anyone.

Collie parks at the bottom of Queenie’s parents’ driveway. The house is silent and still, and everyone else’s cars are gone, which probably means that Bryce has won his bet about people getting kicked out. Either that or they’ve decided that Michael is boring, terrible company, and they left because they don’t want to be around him anymore. It’s such a mean thing to think, and I feel bad for a little bit before I remember that he cheated on me, and then I go back to wanting to drown him in the Pacific Ocean.

“Lucky,” Collie says.

“If this is about therapy, I don’t want to hear it,” I say.

She sighs. I know she’s looking at me: I can practically feel the tilt of her head and the weight of her gaze on my skin. I’m still looking out the opposite window, in case my eyes start shining with tears again, because I don’t want her to have to deal with _more_ of my craziness: that isn’t her job. It isn’t anyone’s job at all.

“Just think about it,” she says. “Please. For me?”

Fine. I jerk my head in a stiff nod, if just to appease her: it’s not like I can pay the enormous doctor’s bills that would come from scheduling therapy appointments at Park Nicollet, so why even consider something I can’t have? It’s such a waste of time; even though I literally do nothing at all these days, I somehow have so little time.

“Okay,” Collie says softly, accepting this agreement, and pops the lock on the doors. “I just… I want you to be okay. And I really want you to know I’m not mad at you, okay? I could never be mad at you.”

“You get mad at me all the time,” I point out.

“Yeah, but not like… _mad_ -mad. I’ll always forgive you, Lucky.”

I sink my teeth into my lower lip to keep my eyes from watering. “Okay,” I manage to get out, and I desperately hope she leaves this car soon, because tears are going to start coming out again if she keeps talking. Something must be wrong with me today. I never cry this much, ever: not all at once, and certainly not in the company of other people. Such an act is reserved for the space under my bedcovers, where nobody will ever witness nor disturb me.

I blame Michael. His arrival has thrown off my vibe. He should go back to Japan and never show his face again. I had _previously_ been doing a good job of ignoring his existence, and now… now it’s going to be so much harder.

“Okay,” she says. “I love you, dude.”

“Love you too.”

“Call me. Whenever. Seriously. I’ll listen to you rant. I’m terrible at giving advice, but I’ll even do that too, if you want. Just for you. The Collie Special.”

I huff out a laugh. “Okay.”

“Alright.”

She pulls the door open and steps outside, a brisk gust of wind blowing in and chasing away the warmth in the car as if it had never been there in the first place.

“Text me when you get to your place, so I know you haven’t crashed,” she says.

“Okay.”

“Okay. Love you. Seriously. I’m not mad.”

I finally turn away from the window so I can look at her. She’s popped her head back into the car, and she’s shivering. When she sees my face, she grins a lopsided grin and waves. Shuts the car door. Heads to the back of my car so she can bang on the trunk, and I have to lunge across the gearshift to yank on the trunk opener, because my car is so old that it doesn’t have a remote key fob.

I see her next crunching across the driveway, brown Cub’s bags in her hands, and she turns and waves one more time before jogging up the stairs to the house to ring the doorbell, to grab her coat and anything else that she left behind.

I turn away, still guilty. Climb back over the console and start the car.

I wait until Collie’s in her own car, safely bundled in her enormous coat, before I pull out, watching my rear-view mirror at the stop sign at the end of the road until I see Collie’s Volkswagen pull out of the driveway and head off in the opposite direction.

She turns a corner, and then she’s gone.

I turn back to the road, ramping up the heater now that she isn’t here to yell at me for it, and clutch the steering wheel tightly.

Take a right.

Navigate the few tiny roads until I can get onto the highway, and then I’m headed back home.

It’s a shorter drive to return that it had been to leave, and pretty soon I’m checking my eyes in the mirror set into the sun visor to make sure that I look normal before I head inside. I look… fine. Fine enough. If Dad doesn’t squint, he’ll never know anything happened at all.

I park the car and grab my stuff from the trunk after locking the doors. I have to snort in exasperation, because sitting there, on top of my own bags, is the pint of The Tonight Dough, Jimmy’s face smiling up at me.

_Right, Collie. Like you think I won’t just save this and give it back to you when I see you next._

I stuff the ice cream into one of my bags and haul my stuff up, shivering already, and slam the trunk before running for the house, my keys already out. I go in through the side door, because I can see Dad’s outline through the living room window, and he’s on the couch, and it’s not that I want to avoid him, but sometimes he gets into these talkative moods, and I don’t want to talk about this afternoon. Ever. Even with my dad.

The kitchen still connects to the living room, so I’ll still have to pass him to get to my room, but maybe I can sneak past when he’s not looking. Really, the only other option is to climb in through my window in the middle of the day, and I’m not really the type to do that. The neighbors would get a kick out of _that_ show, but I’m not tall enough for it to work (trust me, I’ve tried). Besides, there’s the window screen blocking the way. It only detaches from the inside, and I’m not psychotic enough to slash it open with a knife because the only knives I have on hand are the little plastic ones from McDonald’s, which are stashed as emergency cutlery in the car, and those don’t even do a great job of cutting _food_ , much less a mesh of metal wire.

The side door releases me into the kitchen alongside a blast of cold air, and I shake myself vigorously, like I can slough off the cold by will alone.

“Hey, baby,” Dad calls from the living room, before I’ve even gotten out of the entry. Great. “How was brunch?”

“It was fine.” I fall back onto the door so it slams into the doorframe—because the door’s a little broken and if you don’t slam it, it doesn’t close right—and shuck off my shoes. Kick them to the side. Make my way into the kitchen and wash my hands, then go to shove the groceries in the millennium-old fridge (so old that the freezer part is still on top of the refrigerator part).

“Yeah?”

“Yeah.”

“Doesn’t really sound like it,” Dad says, a little too offhand to be truly casual, and I wonder if one of my friends have texted him and snitched. Collie’s had my dad’s phone number ever since freshman year of high school, when we became friends, because when I’d first invited her over, her mother demanded both of my parents’ phone numbers in case of emergencies. Then, because Collie had his number, every single person in my friend group ended up getting his number because Collie is horrible at keeping secrets, and now all my friends resolutely text him at least once a week because they think he’s “absolutely precious.” I’ve had to threaten them with punching out their kidneys, because they wanted to add him to our WhatsApp group chat, too, and there is stuff that we talk about on there that I never my dad to see.

Ever.

“What do you mean? It was great,” I say, sticking resolutely to my story. “Super fun.” I toss the Cub Foods bags under the sink and wash my hands. Dry them on the terry towel hanging from the oven door. Dally a little more before I decide to face the inevitable and go hover by the kitchen door.

My eyes immediately find Dad’s. He’s on the old brown couch, Costco reading glasses perched on his nose, a red-and-brown blanket on his lap and a pair of knitting needles in his hands, slowly and methodically working with an enormous skein of cream worsted weight yarn. Lion Brand. One hundred percent wool. According to him, the only yarn worth buying.

“Do you want to talk about it?” he asks, still blasé.

“Who’s texted you?”

He gives me a look of wide-eyed innocence, his needles pausing for just a second. “I can’t just want to talk with my son?”

I roll my eyes. “Dad.”

He sniffs regally and puts the knitting down on the long coffee table that stretches between the couch and the TV. “Come on, c’mere.” He pats the seat beside him.

I go.

Not because I actively _want_ to talk about what brunch had been like, but I’m feeling a bit bad for myself—fine, _a lot_ bad for myself—and I like snuggles, okay?

I plop down on the couch and scoot over so that I’m sharing Dad’s lap-blanket; he tugs me even closer so that I’m under his arm. I’ve always fit well there. Dad’s the big lumberjack type; he did this Ancestry thing once and found out he’s descended from the Norwegians who immigrated to work in the white pine forests of northern Minnesota in the 1850s; Collie, when she came over once, pointed out in a hushed whisper that if he was gay and, like, seventy-five pounds heavier, he’d be a bear, and I had brained her with a nearby book, because _that_ was not a picture I ever needed of my dad, and that has certainly not helped me “get back on the ride” after ditching a certain _someone_ ’s cheating ass, because apparently it’s a popular thing for twinks to get with bears and I’m sorry, I can’t fuck someone who reminds me of my dad, I don’t have an Electra complex, and besides: I don’t want some rando dude who’s hairy and fifty to a hundred pounds overweight and wants me to call them ‘Daddy,’ I just want Mi—

“Why’re you upset?”

I blink for a second, too busy reeling out of _that_ mental betrayal—I make a note to start looking up ways to self-lobotomize myself—and then say, lamely, “I’m not,” as if my red and puffy eyes don’t exist and he can’t see them.

Dad sighs. He’s started to trace little patterns against my side with a couple of fingertips, slowly, and it makes delicious little shivers run up and down my back.

I whack my head on his chest, gently enough that I don’t pop any of his ribs but hard enough so he gets the vibe that I don’t want to talk about it. I can hear his breathing, from where I’m propped; it’s deep and even. He’s so calm all the time, and I’m just so… not.

Would I have been calmer if I’d been his biological child? His and Mom’s?

I whuffle out a sad breath, probably doing a really bad job of pretending I’m having a great day.

“It’s alright,” Dad says. “You don’t have to pretend to be doing fine when you’re not.”

I don’t answer him, because that sounds like something off a counseling pamphlet.

Dad goes for a different tactic. “Heard… Micah is back in town.”

“His name is _Michael_ ,” I snap before I can even think about it, because my brain-to-mouth filter has been shredded after today’s events.

Dad cranes his head down to look at me so that I can see his unimpressed look, his eyebrows raised over the tops of the rims of his glasses. “That was a bit catty, even for you.”

I scowl at the black screen of the TV.

“And?”

“And what?”

He hesitates, like he doesn’t really know how to approach this subject, which I want to tell him is _great_ , because we really don’t have to be having this discussion at all. “How do you feel about it?”

“I wasn’t aware that you’re suddenly the therapist Collie’s trying to set me up with.”

He cuffs me on the side of the head, gently. “Don’t be like that.”

I burrow my nose into his shirt because I’m too proud to bite out a simple, _I’m sorry_. Dad smells like… _Dad_ : faintly peppery from whenever he cooks and slightly citrusy and flowery because of our laundry detergent. The only thing that’s missing right now is Mom, on my other side. Warm, a pulse thudding through her chest and bumping against my arm. Warm, smelling like vanilla, because she always loved vanilla.

I don’t eat anything vanilla anymore.

I can’t.

“I don’t care about it,” I say instead, by way of answer to his question.

“You can, you know. It’s okay to feel. After what… happened.”

Neither of us like discussing it.

It had been such a trash time.

Why had I left Mom? Why had I been that stupid, to leave her to face… _death_ alone? How did she feel, knowing I hadn’t been there, when she’d taken her last breath?

The part that…. The part that I hate most is that she never knew. She never knew what happened with Michael. She died, thinking I was going to be happy. She died thinking I was going to make myself a family. And none of that happened. I don’t have her. I don’t have Michael. I only have Dad, and he’s the only thing that’s keeping me from slitting my wrists and taking a soak in the bathtub, because… because it would ruin him, to lose his son, too. At least, that’s what I tell myself. That’s what I try to believe. My brain, on the other hand, likes to tell me I’m so cowardly that I can’t even kill myself, and that makes me two times a failure of a man. And Mom doesn’t even know. Maybe… maybe it’s better that way, though. Maybe it’s better that she can think that I’m out here, living my best life, so she doesn’t have to worry about me, even when she’s dead.

“Yeah, I feel a bunch of things,” I snap, blinking back tears. “I feel like punching him in his stupid, perfect face, and then going and crying about it for a few hours. And then maybe, like, being petty and keying his car.”

Dad doesn’t sigh at me like I’m stupid: he chuckles instead, and his arm tightens momentarily. “You should march right up to him and demand an apology.”

I sniffle. “I already marched right up to him and emotionally devastated him.”

“Oh?”

I turn farther into his side so my voice is slightly muffled, because my cheeks are getting heated just remembering what had happened. “He cornered me in the kitchen. At Queenie’s parents’ place.”

Dad twirls his fingers, and it helps me relax: a little bit, at least. You can’t stay tense for long when you’re literally physically melting from some physical contact. If I’d still been together with Michael, we probably would’ve gone somewhere after brunch and had the best welcome-back sex of both of our lives (if we hadn’t, like, blown each other in Queenie’s bathroom or something), and then he’d lie on top of me while I played with his hair; but I’m _not_ with him, so snap at myself to stop fantasizing.

“Is he sufficiently emotionally devastated that he’s going to be leaving you alone from now on?”

I make a weird noise that’s somewhere between “I don’t know” and “He better.”

Because I don’t want to deal with him anymore. Don’t want to think about him, or Mom, or that one terrible fucking day that is gouged into my memory more than anything else.

“It’s not your fault,” Dad whispers, as if he can read my mind.

I grit my teeth and swallow hard. “I know that,” I force myself to say, even though I still barely believe it.

“You should. I’ll keep telling you over and over and over, because I want you to know that even if you think you hate yourself, I love you, Lucky. I love you so much and I will always love you even after I die, and Mom loves you and she’s watching you and I _promise_ she doesn’t blame you at all.

“You are loved. You’ve been loved ever since we picked you up from the hospital; you were the best thing to ever happen to me and Mindy.”

I shake my head, throat aching, burying my face in Dad’s shoulder to hide the tears threatening to fall again. He pulls me tighter into a bear hug, because my dad gives the best hugs I’ve ever had, and I’ve missed the circle of his arms so much.

“Yes,” says Dad. “If I can promise you one thing, Lucky, if you ever believe one thing I say, let it be that.”


	6. I Rendezvous with the Four Lesser-Known Fates at Costco

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I fucking hate university so much I spend all my time studying outside of classes because my professors can’t be bothered to teach their students the material and then by the time I’m done with my millions of textbook readings, I’m burnt out and have zero energy for writing; this chapter took SO LONG and tbh I’m a little anxious about how good it is because it’s the first full chapter I’ve written since getting off the high I was on when I first started this story like a year ago (and wrote the first three chapters in like one four-hour sitting) but I’ve been staring at it so long trying to think of edits that my brain has fallen out of my ears, so here, have it, take it before I lose my mind. Please know this chapter contains fleeting (major) spoilers for both _Lord of the Flies_ and _Of Mice and Men_.

“Okay, Lucky,” Jackie hisses as Queenie disappears behind the shelf of pens and papers. “Queenie’s going to be a minute in the bathroom at least. Add to that a minute to get there and two more to get back and find us, and that’s six minutes. So here’s what we’re going to do—”

“Actually,” cuts in Ella, shoving a packet of gendered Bic pens back on the shelf, “she told me she’s starting a new habit of using tampons. So she’ll probably be at least three minutes in there.”

“—Three minutes,” amends Jackie. Then: “Has she never used tampons before? How can it take _three minutes_ to put a tampon in?”

“She has. Like, four times. As in, four tampons during her thirty years on this earth. This is the fifth, I think. She called me yesterday to tell me that she wasn’t sure how deep she should be putting them in, because it kept hurting when she sat down, even though she was sure the tampon was all the way in because she couldn’t see any white. I told her that her vag was probably just super dry and she should be using a tampon with a lower absorbency.”

“Doesn’t pussy, like… _end_ at some point? I’m pretty sure it ends. Can you bottom out with a tampon?” Jackie says, and Ella smacks him hard enough that a mom shepherding her family of two little boys and one girl down the aisle glances at us with concern.

“Seriously?” I hiss at my idiots when she turns back around.

“Vagina endings notwithstanding,” says Jackie, earning him another slap, “we’ve wasted thirty seconds now. We have five and a half minutes. Lucky, get in the cart.”

“Why the hell am I getting in the cart?”

“’Cuz,” says Jackie with a wicked grin. “We’re gonna make a runway out of this pitiful aisle and send you to space, bay- _bee_.”

“Have you gone insane?” I ask incredulously, even though I’m tempted. “Do you want us to get kicked out?”

“We won’t get kicked out,” says Jackie, wheeling the cart around so fast that it skids on the concrete floor and making for the back connecting aisle, away from all the main traffic, where all the printer paper stuff gradually turns into cooking utensils as you go from the entry of this store into the bowels of the produce section and further damn yourself to the dawning realization that this Costco is so fucking large (and the concrete walls are so dummy thicc) that your cell phone reception is blocked.

 _At least that means I’ll stop getting texts from Michael_ , I think bitterly. Because he keeps texting me. Valiantly. Like, entire paragraphs. Every time one pops up, I delete the thread before I can succumb to temptation and look at it and start thinking about him as a human being who might possibly regret his actions. Well, he can regret away: what’s done is done. He can’t _change_ the fact that that girl was… _there_. To put it tastefully. Though there had probably been zero things _taste_ ful about that night, if we ignore how _that girl_ had probably been tasting Michael’s cum (a ghastly thought).

Even still, sometimes I accidentally read part of his messages; the beginnings say stupid things like:

Michael: I swear I didn’t know, I’m really really sorry, can we meet up and talk about this PLEASE, I…

Michael: I know it’s my fault, I understand that it’s my fault, I want to apologize in person, can yo…

Michael: Lucky, I know you haven’t blocked me yet. Don’t be a jerk. We both know you aren’t a jerk, a…

Michael: Answer your texts, Lucky, I swear to god, I don’t want to have this conversation over text. C…

Michael: Please will you just listen to me for once in your life?! I’m fucking sorry, I’m sorry, just…

Michael: Lucky, don’t be a child and ignore my texts. I need to talk to you. At least give me a chanc…

Michael: I NEVER HAD SEX WITH HER, I don’t know what you saw, but I can explain it, please let me exp…

Et cetera.

I don’t care about them.

He deserves to squirm.

He deserves to do _more_ than squirm. I’ve considered, several times, texting back and telling him to go sit on a very sharp, long metal object, but I’ve currently decided to be the better man. You know, since _Michael_ obviously isn’t going to be winning that competition anytime soon.

I don’t even know why I haven’t blocked him yet. I’m insane, that’s the only valid conclusion I can come to, and my brain agrees. Do I like torturing myself?

I assure myself that he’s got to stop _sometime_ before he comes off as… unattractively desperate and clingy, and also a bit stalker-y. Surely he has more self-awareness than to keep texting me fifty times a day, though I’m not entirely sure because he’s shamelessly been at it for the past four days, counting Sunday.

Also, if I’ve got his name saved in my contacts now, that means nothing other than the fact that I don’t want to accidentally memorize his new number. At least I can fucking forget the old one now (if my brain will _finally_ agree with me that the knowledge is now _useless_ ).

“…nobody’s here, anyway,” Jackie is saying now. “Barely anyone ever uses this aisle. Nobody even checks out this section, they stop at the jewelry, and then they breeze right past and go straight to the produce. Best place to do it, other than the giant empty space where the t.p. is. Let’s go, before Queenie gets back and yells at us!”

“You’re such a _child_ ,” I say, but I follow anyway, and I know deep down that I’m going to end up getting in the cart no matter what protests come to mind. Jackie’s just Like That: he’s a moron, but his energy is infectious. “Jason’s going to come back from electronics and kick your ass.”

“I’d kick his ass first,” Jackie boasts. “I took karate when I was in eighth grade and I know how to do a mean front snap kick.” He waggles the cart enticingly. “Come on, dude, you obviously need a distraction from Michael…”

Before I can open my mouth and defend myself with some lie about how _that isn’t true_ , I’m not even _thinking_ about him, Jason jogs around the corner and latches onto Jackie’s arm, yanking him close and ignoring Jackie’s surprised squawk and the screechy jolt of the cart. Jason whispers something in Jackie’s ear; Jackie’s eyes go wide.

“Gimme a sec,” he says hastily, and then they both disappear around the corner. I’m left alone with Ella and the cart.

We look at each other.

“What the fuck are _they_ up to? Are they going to elope?”

She snickers, clambering up the side of the cart and swinging into it, making herself a nest out of the coats chucked in there. “That would be sexy, wouldn’t it? You’d have converted more of the friend group into being gay. I think I should be next. Maybe women will treat me any better than men,” she says, and I abruptly remember that I’m not the only one who went through a breakup—I’m not even the one that went through a breakup _recently_ —but Ella’s probably not getting all the attention she deserves because of the dysfunction that’s _me_ , and an awful, a thin strand of nausea climbs in my throat, trying to make it to my brain and turn my mind against me.

“I’m sorry… sorry about Peyton,” I say.

Ella pauses in the middle of very carefully laying my coat on top of her like it’s a blanket made of the finest silk. “It’s fine,” she says, very stiffly and very carefully, so unlike the careless way she usually carries out conversations.

“If you… want to talk about it, I’m always here,” I offer.

“I’d rather not,” she says sweetly. She sits up abruptly and reaches over, patting my hand on the handle of the cart. “It’s not you. It’s just that I don’t want to think about him, much like you don’t want to think about Michael. I guess the difference between us is that Peyton’s staying in Brisbane with Laurel, Karri, and Lakelynne because he’s satisfied by _their_ pussies, and I won’t ever have to see him again, while Michael came back, it seems, _specifically_ to plague you. Because he is _unsatisfied_ about not having your dick.”

I glare somewhat at her. “You know how you don’t want to talk about Peyton? I don’t want to talk about Michael.”

“Too bad,” says Ella. “I need to get my mind off my breakup, and you are my new pet project, especially after that bomb dropped on Sunday.” She clears her throat a little pointedly and reclines, like royalty, against her throne of other peoples’ coats, raising one eyebrow at me.

I look away and say nothing. What am I supposed to say? I’ve already heard so much about it ( _hundreds_ of texts) and I still have no excuse prepared. I just figure… nobody _else_ spews their problems all the time like they’re a bird regurgitating food for their young, so why should _I_? I don’t _need_ the attention. I would rather the attention be elsewhere, in fact. Elsewhere somewhere far, far away from me. In fact, I think people should start hounding Bryce about _his_ love life! Bryce is _twenty-eight_ going on _twenty-nine_ and _still_ single, despite the fact that fucks like a rabbit and has probably bedded half the population of America. I open my mouth to mention this—

“Push me around,” Ella demands.

“Ugh.” Obediently, I rest my forearms on the handle of the cart and start shoving. Ella might be tiny, but she weighs as much as a stack of bricks; I’m smart enough to keep the grunting to a minimum because I’m fond of my penis, even if I don’t really use it super frequently any more, and I would not like for it to disappear in the middle of the night under mysterious circumstances. “Where are we going?”

“We’re ditching Jackie. I’m getting tired of his misogyny. Take me to the bananas, slave.”

“You like bananas all of a sudden?” I mutter, because Ella has never willingly touched a banana in her life except to use it as a sex toy.

“What was that?” she asks sweetly.

“Nothing. We’re going to lose Jason and Queenie, too, if we go over there.”

“That’s fine. They can find us; they at least have some brain cells to use. I’m sure Jackie is just _so_ in love with Jason that they will not stop holding hands, and Jason can guide him to safety. Either that or Jackie can die here in Costco, and that would also be fine.”

I snort, pretending like she _wouldn’t_ start wailing at any of our friends’ deaths, wheeling the cart past a couple more families and some white dad who looks at me weird as we pass. I don’t look back at him and instead tighten my hands on the cart, as if this can absolve me of some of my anxiety of being stared at.

“So,” says Ella as we wheel past some employee advertising a recliner.

“‘So,’ what?”

“You left the group chat.”

“God, _this_ again?”

“Tell me why.”

“You know why,” I say, perhaps a little testily, shoving the cart hard to take a turn. Jesus, what did Ella eat for breakfast today, _concrete_?

“No I don’t.”

“My finger slipped.”

She glares at me with a significant amount of poison in her eyes (Ella likes to think she’s the only one who can ever utilize sarcasm). “Your finger slipped, _nine times_?”

“It would’ve been just once, if you guys hadn’t kept adding me back in.”

“You’re lucky we didn’t add your dad, too,” she sniffs. “If only just to collar you.”

My brain perks up at the mention of this, immediately making it dirty. _Remember that one fantasy you have?_ it asks eagerly. _The one where Michael straps a collar around your neck and chokes you with it while telling y—_

I am _so_ close to screaming, just to drown out my own thoughts. As it is, this would probably be deemed psychopathic behavior considering I’m in the middle of a public place full of strangers, so I settle for hissing at Ella, “You made me a _promise_ ,” and shoving my body really close to the cart, praying desperately that I don’t get a boner in the middle of a fucking _Costco_ because of my overactive imagination.

 _That was_ once _! TWO MONTHS AGO! And only because I was really horny!_ I yell at my brain. _That ship has sailed already!_

 _Has it?_ my brain asks. _Also, I’m pretty sure it was more like five times in three hours. Maybe six. Two of those times were dry. Afterwards, you CHAFED._

 _Fuck you, fuck off, fuck you, fuck off_ , I chant, turning my mind to starving African children and tertiary syphilis.

“I know, but let me tell you, I almost broke it. I don’t think anything would’ve ever felt so good. Karma, you know? Ahh, karma. Do you know her, Lucky?”

I ignore this comment. “Are you going to add me back?”

She shakes her phone at me, grinning unapologetically. “As soon as I get service again.”

“You too?”

“T-Mobile sucks,” she says. “Besides. We kicked Michael out temporarily. He wouldn’t stop spamming us. I think he was getting a little butt-hurt that you’re ignoring his messages to you.”

“I don’t know what messages you’re talking about,” I say stiffly, coming to a standstill because there’s a jam of carts in front of us.

Ella snorts. “Well, it makes me feel a bit better that _our_ messages weren’t the only ones you were ignoring.”

“I wasn’t _ignoring_ your messa—”

“Okay,” says Ella, ceding this argument much more quickly than I thought she would. “Anyway, then. Do you want to come clubbing with me this evening and pick up a super hot hunk to rail you into the mattress for seven hours straight? Heh, or maybe seven hours _gay_ , if you know what I mean,” she adds, but I’m too busy choking and losing control of the cart to register this for a second.

“ _Excuse_ me?” I narrowly miss running into a small child while I maneuver around the pileup and have to apologize profusely.

“You know. Obviously, so that you can get Michael off your mind since he’s moved back here. And I need to hook up with someone to get the reminder of Peyton’s c-o-c-k out of my mind.”

“It’s so memorable that you still think about it, huh?”

Ella’s head snaps around from spectating baking pans made by Nordic Ware and she narrows her eyes at me.

 _Holy fuck_ , says my brain. _She’s going to bring up why_ you _still think about_ Michael’s _cock all the time. You don’t have any lies prepared about that, do you? Also, here, think about it some more!_ _Remember how he was uncircumcised? And how you really liked that? ALSO, remember the way he’d always do that one specific groan when you ran your tongue along his frenulum?_

“Side note,” says Ella, while I panic. “Have you ever googled images of Fournier’s gangrene?”

I shove my useless brain away hastily, trying to pretend that I’m not at all guilty about thinking of Michael. “I, um. Yes. Yes, I have. Dare I query as to why you are asking me this?”

“No reason,” Ella says, with a very Grinch-like smile. She snaps out of it after a second. “Anyway, I don’t want to go alone. You know I’ll get overrun. Look at me, I’m so small.”

“And you think taking _me_ with you is going to help with that?” I gesture to myself, all five feet and two-and-a-half inches of it.

“Man, we all know you could slap someone halfway across America if you wanted to,” Ella says dismissively. “Don’t pretend that you couldn’t. I’m honestly very surprised you didn’t go to town on Michael last week.”

My stomach lurches at the mention of Michael at brunch, like it wants to start some heaving, but I haven’t eaten anything yet today.

“Should I have?”

“Hell yeah,” says Ella. “He deserves it. You should’ve used Queenie’s dad’s cleaver to chop his bitties right off. That’s what _I_ would’ve done. In fact, I’m still planning on doing that after the way he talked to me. Be a dear and don’t tell anyone, alright?”

“You are extremely bloodthirsty,” I say, wheeling us next to the bananas, while my brain yells at me to save Michael’s dick—we might need it later. “Here.”

“Like _you_ aren’t,” she snorts, peering over the edge of the cart to inspect the fruit. After about a minute of staring intensely at one single banana bunch: “These are unsatisfactory. Take me somewhere else.”

I snort and roll my eyes, but shove at the cart again, having to do some heavy maneuvering to make sure we don’t crash into anyone else or their carts.

“I almost cut off _Peyton_ ’s boy bits when I found out he was cheating,” Ella tells me. “ _Three_ different pussies were involved. Did you know that? _Three_ , not including mine. I hope he gave them all scabies.”

“Ah yes: Laurel, Karri, and Lakelynne. Who in their right mind names their kid Lakelynne?”

“White people,” Ella mutters, and I snort.

“Also, maybe you should keep your voice down when you talk about scabies. I think we’re in a family-friendly establishment right now,” I say.

“Scabies _is_ family friendly.”

“Only if incest is involved.”

We chuckle softly, horrified with ourselves.

“Anyway, I’m losing track of the conversation here,” says Ella. “You keep distracting me, you menace.”

“I’m great at that.”

“Not the point,” she says, cutting me off. “Be quiet. We need to find you a man.”

“I don’t need no man.”

“Because you’re an independent woman?”

“That’s right. Also, what happened to guys setting me back up with Michael?” I ask dryly.

“That’s been on standby,” Ella says without an ounce of shame, “since we found out about the proposal thing. You know, the thing that you _didn’t tell us_.”

I don’t meet her eyes, guilt strangling me momentarily.

“Anyway,” Ella says, after clearing her throat haughtily. “Obviously, you are forgiven for that, considering that extenuating circumstances were involved in the incident. It doesn’t mean we’re still not upset, of course, but we are more upset at the moment at Michael, considering he squandered his opportunity to be with the best man that’s ever going to come his way.”

My throat clenches up. “Shut up,” I say. “You don’t mean that.”

 _Best man that’s ever going to come his way?_ my brain wonders, for once not turning it into something I can doubt. It almost seems… surprised. As if it couldn’t comprehend how I could be a force of good.

 _Take that, idiot brain!_ I crow at it, and it scowls at me.

“I do, but whatever. You can ignore it if that’ll help you not cry in public. Obviously, however, it now becomes prudent for you to show Michael that you have moved on, and what better way to do that than to bring a hunk with you the next time you show up for lunch? Also, I might be a bit of a sadist, because I _definitely_ want to watch him squirm at that.”

I nearly run into a stand of apricots. “I think Jackie’s rubbing off on you,” I tell her. “That’s a _terrible_ idea.”

“Oh yeah? Why? Tell me. I’ve thought it all out. Here, I’ll even tell you my thought process: you and Michael used to be together. You and Michael used to have a ton of sex, so much so that even the President of the United States probably knew about it…”

 _You practically still_ do _have sex with him, considering the number of times you think about him while you’re jacking off, the few times that you_ do _jack off. That can’t be healthy. You should probably see someone for that illness. Like, the hunk that Ella’s talking about. He might have an_ injection _to help with that, if you know what I mean?_

 _Shut up_ , I tell my brain, who’s busy sniggering.

“…and now you’ve broken up. Michael is obviously devastated. It’s your job, as his ex, to devastate him more because, tragically, this is a job only you can do, as much as the rest of us would love to do it for you, considering Michael’s idiocy. And, there is never any better way to devastate someone than to show them you no longer need them.”

“Right,” I say. “I didn’t need Michael just for his dick, though. So this isn’t really something that can be solved by a hookup.”

“Goodness, what _else_ was he good for?” Ella asks, and I feel myself turning red at… sappy memories. Him kissing my eyelids after I cried; him comforting me when I got back home after Mom’s diagnosis; him humming old lullabies when we were wrapped up in his bed, probably because he thought I was asleep and couldn’t hear; him assuring me that it was fine to fail a class at college, that wouldn’t be the end of the world; him coming and visiting me at the hospital after I broke my arm in a car crash and needed seven stitches; him bobbing around in the kitchen, cooking; him pointing out stupid inconsistencies in the old movies we liked to watch, and listening to me rant about musicals.

“Uh. Nothing. Really.” I look away to the floor, watching gray concrete pass as I push the cart, trying to figure out if I might be dying a little inside, and that’s why I feel like… throwing up my heart. Because it had been nothing, hadn’t it? He’d been lying that whole time, since he wasn’t there that one time I really needed him. Had it all been just one dragged-out long-con so that he could shatter my heart into splinters? Because it worked, if so: I’m pretty fucking damaged right now. Maybe I _should_ get a hookup, like Ella says, just to see his face; to show him how goddamned _mad_ I had been. How mad I _am_. Then would he feel the same way I had, that day in Japan?

“Hmm.” Ella sounds like she might be able to see right through me, but before I can _really_ start to get worried, I look up and see Jason, dragging Jackie behind him like a little child.

“Oh look!” I point out in a voice _way_ too cheerful to be realistically compatible with my morose mood from only moments before. “The men have returned from their man-trip.”

Ella is successfully diverted: she leans toward them so far out of the cart that I’m afraid she’ll fall and croons, “How was your honeymoon, boys?”

“It was fantastic,” Jackie says, not even fazed as he trots to keep up with Jason, nearly running himself into the side of the cart and plowing me into a stand of kiwis. “Jason promised me a twenty-four-carat ring.”

“What?” says Jason, suddenly looking very alarmed and very confused.

Jackie bats his eyes and loops an arm around Jason’s, hugging him tightly while Jason futilely attempts to remove himself from the situation. “We’re going to have a June wedding,” he says. “Because we love summer so much.”

“I said _honeymoon_ ,” Ella snaps in her typical manner of dealing with idiots. “You guys have to be married already to have a honeymoon.”

“I actually hate summer,” Jason points out. “That’s bug season, and bugs are disgusting. Also, heat is gross. Like, when you’re cold, you can always put on more clothes, but what’re you supposed to do when you’re too hot? Take off your skin?”

“Preach,” I tell him, and he fist-bumps me.

“What are you guys talking about?” Jackie says, not paying attention and looking around. “Also, why are we in produce? Do we eat green things?”

“We are functioning adults,” Ella reminds him.

“You’re in a Costco cart right now,” says Jackie, “wrapped in five coats. I don’t think you’re functioning quite as well as you think you are.”

“Slut,” she hisses. “I will end you.”

“Well, don’t mind me,” says Jason, finally disentangling himself from Jackie with some effort. “I’ll just… go get vegetables and be a Functioning Adult. I don’t suppose it would be too much to ask you guys to stay in one place, so I don’t have to search the whole store for you when I need the cart?”

“We were talking about how Ella’s going clubbing to find a new man—woman—She wants to go lesbian,” I tell Jackie.

Jason mutters something that sounds like, “Dear Christ,” and scrubs his face with his hands before leaving.

“Why is Ella going lesbian?”

“To forget about Peyton’s penis,” I say, while Ella glares at me. I bat my eyes at her innocently.

“Wow, that good, huh?” Jackie says.

“Jackie,” Ella snarls, “you better start thinking about what comes out of your mouth, or you’re going to end up like Michael. You know how you’re always complaining about school? You won’t _need_ to complain by the time I’m done with you, because you won’t _need_ to go to school anymore.”

“I’ve seen you fart in bubble baths,” says Jackie. “You don’t scare me anymore.”

“Why the hell,” I say, “were you two taking bubble baths together?”

They look at me guiltily.

“Listen,” says Jackie. “That was a long time ago. That was before we knew you! You don’t need to concern yourself with it.”

“Indeed,” says Ella, who never agrees with _anything_ Jackie says. “Also, we were talking about _you_ too, don’t you think I can’t see your efforts to steer the conversation to a different topic. I am not quite as amazingly interesting, nor heartbroken, as you.”

“I’d like to disagree,” I say sweetly.

She hums and gives me the fakest smile I’ve ever seen: and that’s saying a lot, considering I have almost exclusively hung out with Bryce for the past two-ish years.

Jackie leans heavily against the side of the cart, sending it to nose into a tall stack of cardboard boxes, then decides that he’s bored and nudges me aside so he can take possession of the handlebars.

“Jackie,” warns Ella, “if you do anything remotely risqué while I am in this cart, I’ll cryogenically freeze you.”

He pouts. “Why are _you_ in the cart? I want to push around Lucky. He’s lighter than you.”

“Tough luck,” she snaps. “You have muscles. Work it out.”

“Lucky’s more fun than you, too.”

“That’s because Lucky’s had two years to get off his breakup, and I’ve had less than a month,” she says, strained despite all her protests that she’s doing fine and she doesn’t care, and I open my mouth to say something, right when she looks at me (like she can predict that I want to comfort her) and goes: “And besides, that man? He was one among hundreds. It was nothing like the epic romance you and Michael had.”

“Jesus fuck, it wasn’t an _epic romance_ ,” I say immediately, all my pity wiped away in point-five seconds and replaced by annoyance. “Who have you been hanging out with? Don’t answer that. Obviously, the wrong people. You need to go on a cleanse now that you’ve moved back here and are among the sane once more.”

“Indeed,” says Ella smugly, in that way she has when she thinks she’s already won a conversation. “And what better way to do that than to go out with a few of my friends?”

Jackie perks up eagerly. I narrow my eyes at him a little bit, because if he’s messing around with Collie, he shouldn’t be messing around with anyone else, but it’s not like I can _say_ anything, even as her best friend, because Collie is very much like her mother in that she likes her private life to stay confidential until she deems it prudent to release a few choice details, and if I ever let it spill to certain people that I know… _things_ … she would definitely get _mad_ -mad at me, because nobody in our friend group can keep a secret, and once _one_ other person knows, everyone will know, and she won’t be in control.

“Where are you going?” Jackie asks eagerly, waggling the cart back and forth a little before deciding to completely ignore Jason’s orders to stay put and taking off toward the bread.

“We’re not going _anywhere_.” My insisting falls on deaf ears.

“I don’t know yet,” Ella muses. “Where do all the gay boys hang out nowadays? Grindr? Is it Grindr?”

“Grindr is an app, not a club,” I say, trotting behind them.

“I was on Grindr once,” Jackie says, completely off-topic, rounding a table of Danishes.

We stare at him.

“What?” he says.

“Why were _you_ on Grindr?”

“The gays can’t corner the market on dick, you know. That’s selfish, and I wanted to try it. I didn’t really like it all that much, though. I’m a tits man, and the only time you get tits on a dude is when he’s a chub. And I don’t really find super overweight people attractive. Also, I discovered I hate it when people put stuff up my butt. So, I stick to women and stay away from pegging.”

I blink slowly at him.

Ella blinks slowly at him.

“ _What_?” he demands, but he doesn’t have time to put any heat behind it because his eyes get caught on a slender young black woman who’s fifteen feet away, picking through mangoes.

“Good for you for experimenting,” says Ella.

At the same time, I say, “Jackie, disgusting. Peel your eyes off her. This isn’t First Avenue, this is _Costco_.”

He coughs delicately into his fist. “I don’t know what we’re talking about. Why don’t we go to the books?”

“The books?” repeats Ella incredulously.

“Since when do you read?” Jason asks, coming up behind me and making me jump.

“That’s a bit mean,” says Ella; she doesn’t complain as Jason dumps on her several containers of butter lettuce, blueberries, and blackberries, and a couple bags of asparagus and French green beans; she just kicks her feet to make room at the head of the cart because she can’t be bothered to stack the produce like a normal person. Michael would have a heart attack if he were here right now, seeing the way the plastic boxes and bags are haphazardly thrown into a corner without being organized.

“Sorry,” says Jason, dodging a smack from a scowling Jackie and affecting an expression of chagrin. “I meant, since when does you read _fiction_? The last time I went over to your apartment, the entire place was run down with architecture manuals and textbooks. I think the last thing you willingly read that was an actual piece of artistic writing was _The Lord of the Flies_ in freshman year in high school.”

“Were you _also_ obsessed with Piggy’s death scene?” Ella asks Jackie eagerly. “I was. I read that shit nonstop. Lennie’s death scene in _Of Mice and Men_ , too. I swear, those were the only interesting parts in those disgustingly boring books.”

“My friends are psychopaths,” I tell nobody in particular.

“What’s going on?”

I yelp and leap around to see Queenie breathing over my shoulder, finally done with her tampons in the women’s room, as Jackie tells Ella he doesn’t even remember what happened in those books. “Dear lord, does nobody _announce_ their _presence_ anymore?”

She lays a hand on my shoulder. “Sorry, Lucky.”

“’S alright,” I say, leaning against her sturdy frame for a moment. She’s warm, because she’s the only one of us who’s dressed _sensibly_ for February weather—she’s got on several layers: a blue cashmere sweater over a pink-and-blue plaid button-down, and there’s probably a tank top under _that_ —and she smells like cinnamon and cardamom.

She wraps her arms around my chest and rests her chin on top of my head; my eyes prickle with tears momentarily, because I’ve missed this.

“Jackie’s decided to begin a new job as a literary analyzer,” Ella says.

“I have _not_!”

“Is that my coat that you’re sitting on?” Queenie demands, distracted. “Ella! Get off. That cost a hundred and twenty dollars!”

“You spent a hundred and twenty dollars on a coat?” Ella says, yanking Queenie’s coat out from under her ass. “What the hell, is this a Gucci coat?”

“I see you’ve picked Lucky’s jacket to be your blanket,” Queenie sniffs, letting me go and snatching her coat before Ella can do it further damage. “Favorites, much?”

“Lucky’s allowed to be my favorite,” Ella says. “He’s the hottest. I would date him if he were straight. Since he’s not, I’m trying to hook him up with someone so he can forget about Michael.”

“Ella!” I complain.

Queenie’s eyes narrow.

“Michael’s a dick,” Ella says by way of explanation.

“Michael _is_ a dick,” Queenie agrees, putting a foot on the cart so Jackie stops rocking it and ramming the tip continuously into a bag of bagels that’s falling off the table aside us. “So is Lucky, a little bit.”

I frown. “Excuse me?”

“You’ve been ignoring your phone for four days,” says Queenie, frowning right back at me.

“I have _not_ ,” I say, while Ella declares vehemently and loudly that she already _said that_ , and I eye the table of sweet baked goods as Jason goes browsing again. I think he’s the only one who’s actually doing any shopping. I don’t know what the rest of us are doing. Is going to Costco the Asian version of hanging out at a bar? “I’m _here_ , aren’t I?”

“Yes. Imagine what a surprise it was to come in here and get a cart and see you sulking sadly near the exit,” says Queenie, not unkindly.

“To be fair,” says Ella as Jason dumps some baguettes on her, “Michael _was_ being an asshole in the WhatsApp.”

“True,” grumbles Queenie, reaching into the cart and arranging our groceries _properly_ in a way Michael would’ve approved of. She looks at me. “We kicked him out temporarily.”

“I’m sure he’s foaming at the mouth,” I tell her. Smile a little wearily. “Ella told me.”

Queenie nods.

“Queenie,” announces Jason. “I desperately want a pound cake. However, I cannot eat three of these.” He brandishes a set of loaves at us from a couple feet away.

“I can’t,” Queenie says apologetically. “I made two dozen kanelbullar this morning, and I can’t finish those _and_ that.”

“Two _dozen_?” says Ella. “Can I have some?”

She and Queenie start working out a trade while Jason looks at me pleadingly. “Lucky?”

“Yeah, sure,” I say, trying to seem humble and not like a rat that’s just found a particularly full trash can and now knows exactly where all his lunches for the next week and a half are going to be coming from. Toasted Costco pound cake is _heavenly_ , because the outside of the slice gets all crispy-crunchy from the sugar while the inside stays soft and warm and delicious.

The pound cake lands on Ella’s stomach and she grunts, only not tossing the whole container back at Jason’s head because Queenie grabs her arms.

Jackie, ignoring all of this (I don’t know how, when it’s right in front of him and he normally lives for drama), rests his chin on his hand and turns to look at me with twinkling eyes. “We could go to The Saloon and you could re-create your meeting with Michael,” he offers.

“I didn’t meet Michael at The Saloon and I don’t want to go,” I tell him.

He ignores me. “Ella. Ella? The Saloon?”

Ella manages to wrestle away from Queenie. “The Saloon’s a gay bar.”

“Yes,” Jackie says impatiently, “that’s because we’re looking for a gay man. You know, for Lucky. Why are you complaining? I thought you wanted to find a woman?”

“Excuse me?” says Queenie.

“Ella wants to go lesbian to see if women treat her better than men,” I say.

Queenie raises an impressive set of eyebrows at Ella and Ella has the decency to blush.

“In my defense,” Ella says, “Jackie experimented with dick, so why don’t _I_ get to experiment with pussy? We could all just become loving bisexual friends. We should all just marry each other.”

“I’m not marrying any of you,” I announce, because I feel like this needs to be said; all of my friends are absolutely insane. Everyone goes quiet, though, and turns to look at me.

It barely takes me a second to realize exactly what they’re thinking about.

“Don’t even _mention_ it,” I snap, as Ella opens her mouth, “I swear to god.”

“Lucky—”

“NO. I’m not… doing whatever it is you think I’m doing— _pining_ , or something. Okay? I don’t even think about him anymore, and I would like to keep it that way, and past events that may or may not have occurred are currently irrelevant and hold no substantial weight in today’s happenings.”

There’s a little pause of silence while I avoid looking at all the people whose eyes are _still_ on me.

“Wow, that was a lot of long words,” Jackie says after a moment. “So… The Saloon, then?”

“Jackie,” says Queenie, a warning in her voice.

“If I say ‘fine,’ will you guys leave it and talk about something else?”

“Yes!” says Jackie eagerly. “When are we picking you up? What time is it? Oh, it’s only five-thirty.” He takes out his phone and starts tapping furiously. “Are you going back home? Yes, you are, I can’t take you out looking like _that_ —”

“What’s wrong with the way I look?” I demand before I remember that I want nothing to do with this stupid plan and if they drop me off at home before taking me clubbing, I am going to change into the ugliest thing I own specifically to keep the boys _off_ me, if only to teach my friends that they can’t just go around whoring me out.

“—you need to find something a lot tighter and a lot spanglier. Show off the goods, you know?”

I splutter furiously.

“Hmm, after this I’m busy until nine, so pick you up at… nine-thirty? I don’t know how long we’ll be gone. Plan for all night. Hopefully someone takes you home and you get smashed in someone’s bed, you know, and not in the back bathroom of the club. That just isn’t classy. You don’t have a bedtime, do you? Fuck, why am I even asking, you’re twenty-two, you probably party until three in the morning—”

“Help,” I plead Queenie.

“You’ve damned yourself already,” she points out, but she does smack Jackie upside the head and point out that Jason is wandering toward the meats, which shuts him up while he scrambles to start shoving the cart and struggles to not drop his phone as he does this.

“I’m going to run away to Wyoming and start a new life as a heterosexual man named Chet Smith,” I tell her, with some desperation, as I trail behind Jackie with increasing slowness so his spiel dies out into the distance. Thank god Queenie stays with me so I don’t have to be all alone in this enormous store.

“I’d rather you didn’t,” she says pleasantly. “Montana is so empty. Who would keep you company?”

“I’ll live in the woods. With the wolves.”

“You don’t like raw meat,” she points out. “You kept gagging when the table next to ours was eating _torisashi_ at that restaurant in Japan and you had to change places with Jackie to stop before you puked all over the floor.”

I scowl at the floor, my shoes scuffing the floor as I drag them along on the polished concrete. “Not _my_ fault,” I mutter. “That’s _raw chicken_. I don’t know how they could put it in their mouths.”

 _You were gagging at_ Asian _people eating_ Asian _food? You’re so fucking_ white, says my brain, as if it hadn’t already beaten me up over this fact a million times, especially _when it had happened_ , and I’d hastily excused myself to the bathroom so I could 1) not throw up and 2) stop hyperventilating over the fact that I was probably the worst Asian person ever to exist and also the fact that our table neighbors had been looking at me weird, probably because they thought I’d been criticizing them or something, but it hadn’t been _on purpose_ , I’d honestly tried to stop, but the meat had looked so squishy and slick and slimy and just oh-so-raw, and every time my brain encouraged me to think about what the _texture_ would be like in my mouth (even though _I_ hadn’t been the one eating it), I’d just started gagging again.

“Just a difference in taste,” Queenie says lightly. “And there’s nothing wrong with that,” she adds, as if she can sense what I’m thinking about.

“Yeah,” I mutter, but when she links her arm in mine, I let her lead me over to the cold cuts while the rest of them fuss with the trough filled with chunks of red meat.

“Do you need anything from here?” she asks, leading me over to the refrigerated shelves of deli and picking a packet of cold cuts off the shelf to regally inspect the quality of Kirkland turkey.

“No,” I mutter. I haven’t been in a sandwich mood recently, and whenever I’m not in a ‘mood,’ I resent eating the same thing more than once in the same week. Call me picky, but how am I supposed to change my preferences? I’ve _tried_ , because my parents would raise their eyebrows at me when I turned up my nose at leftovers, but generally whenever I saw stuff I’d already eaten recently on the table, I’d suddenly no longer be hungry, even if I’d been hungry not three minutes before, and that just led to me not eating, so my parents had just sighed and gone with it. I guess that probably makes me a bit spoiled.

It makes me wonder if that’s the same reason I can’t land any other guy to… start something with. After Michael. Is it because I’m picky and they’re not enough like him? It isn’t like there haven’t been _offers_ —there have been: from guys at university; from guys on Grindr; from guys just passing by. I didn’t even know that I was comparing them to Michael until Bryce had casually pointed it out one day when we’d been roasting at the Loring Park Art Festival a couple years back, slouched under a tent, attempting to sell some of my prints. He’d been pointing out the assets of every man in their mid-twenties who passed by (and occasionally stopped by) while I’d been criticizing everything he noticed which, in retrospect, had been a very dick move, but I’d been hot and sweaty and bored as hell and had just wanted to go home so I could sleep, even if it meant I would’ve wasted several thousand dollars printing out all of my shitty art and not selling it because I was too busy being depressed in my bed. Anyway, Bryce must’ve gotten fed up with me, because he’d snapped that ‘Not everyone was going to be like Michael,’ and if I was going to keep comparing everyone to Michael, I might as well get back together with him, and then he’d stormed off for a bit. I’d spent about five minutes feeling sorry about it when Bryce slunk back in, already slightly sunburnt, and we’d both apologized: me for being an ass and him for being pushy. And that had been the end of that.

“I thought you liked turkey?” Queenie asks.

“Not anymore, for now. I ate too much of it a couple months ago.” I’m not proud of the time when practically the only thing I’d eaten for three weeks straight had been turkey, lettuce, and mayonnaise on white bread. Apparently, I only come in extremes.

“Okay,” says Queenie easily, putting the turkey back on the shelf. She doesn’t argue or try to cajole me into getting it: she just accepts that this is the way it is, and I like that about her. My parents used to try to do those kinds of things when I was younger, just to get me to eat, because we weren’t exactly growing money on trees: they’d try to disguise the leftovers as something else, or they’d say that I wasn’t allowed to eat something else, or they’d say if I didn’t eat then I could go hungry. Because I’d been an asshole at thirteen, I’d starved myself until they’d needed to take me to the hospital for malnutrition, and that was when they’d given up.

“Are you going to get anything?” Queenie’s not a vegetarian per se, but she prefers not to eat meat when she can, so I have to wonder why she’s taking me here.

She hums. “No, I don’t think so. Michael did mention that he wanted beef, but I’m not seeing the brand he likes, here.”

I look away, throat tight. I don’t ask what brand he likes, because it doesn’t matter anymore.

Queenie gives a little sigh—I can’t tell if there’s any particular emotion behind it: sadness, frustration, anger—and puts her hand on my shoulder again. “Are you okay?”

“What do you mean? I’m doing fantastic.”

“Well,” says Queenie, steering me away from cold cuts and guiding me down the aisle, “it’s okay if you’re _not_. Honestly, I’m rather surprised you’re saying you’re fine after what happened on Sunday. And I rather think you’re lying.”

I look at her in surprise, all my organs nearly clean dropping out of my body, because—what does she think I’m lying about?

 _How about… everything?_ my brain suggests. _I think a better question would be what_ don’t _you lie about, nowadays?_

I want to open my mouth and demand to know what she means—what she _knows_ —but I know I’ll only incriminate myself if I do this and I do not want my friends to find out that I am a poor college dropout in the middle of a Costco on a Wednesday afternoon. At the very least, they should be _eased_ into the idea, so they don’t freak out all at once and have such a bad reaction that I end up having to kill myself to escape.

“Ravioli?” she asks as we turn the corner into the next aisle.

“Ravioli?” I repeat, not comprehending for a second in the midst of my panicking.

“Yes. Do you want any? I know you don’t care about your lactose intolerance at all.” She steers me around by my shoulder to stare at a wall of tortellini.

“I’m good. I don’t like lobster.”

“Five cheese?”

“Nah. It’s not salty enough.”

She chuckles but takes down a package of organic spinach and cheese ravioli for herself, tucking it under her arm. “Shall we?” She gestures down the aisle and I start sweating, wondering if this is her own specialized way of getting me to break down and spill all my secrets.

We go into the next aisle.

“Guacamole?” Queenie says, like nothing’s wrong.

Oh god, _does she know_?

Could Dad have texted her? _Would_ Dad have texted her? It’s not like I have the password to my dad’s phone, I can’t go through his texts and see who he messages and who he doesn’t message. It’s just used to be that sometimes when I was feeling bad about myself, someone would magically show up at my house and watch Disney with me; or my friends would somehow know about my new food preferences the next time we met up; or they’d always get me exactly what I wanted for my birthday or Christmas. These kinds of things don’t just occur by happenstance.

I have to admit, Dad telling her about the money thing would not be as bad as the college thing. I’d made the mistake of not telling _Dad_ about the college thing for several months, and when he found out…

But Queenie would definitely say something if she knew about that, right?

I shake my head, my palms drenched for literally no reason, and I have to wipe them off on my pants.

Would Dad have texted her that I’m still pining after Michael? Not that Dad knows, probably.

—Not that I’m _pining_.

Dad would call it pining, though, because Dad doesn’t understand that, as a twenty-year-old, it is completely normal for me to lay in my room all day and not anything. I don’t know what he expects: if I don’t _move_ , I’m not going to get hungry, but _nooo_ , he’s got all these ideas in his head and thinks I’m still upset over the breakup (which I _am_ , but so what? Any normal person would be) and keeps trying to yank me out of the house to get over it, but there’s nothing to get over! It’s not even like I sit in bed all day thinking about Michael. It’s like, once or twice per day. That’s it. I’m pretty sure that’s just a symptom of a bad breakup. I may or may not have googled it.

Also, on another note, Queenie was one hundred percent not present for my conversation with Ella, and also can’t read minds, so she can’t know I think about Michael’s dick. _Sometimes_.

I think.

Can she read minds?

What if she can read minds and can see that I still think about boning Michael and had (very briefly) considered kicking him in the crotch and then sucking his balls while at her parents’ place? She’s probably planning on feeding me poison just for that, because that’s her _parents’_ house.

“Hmm,” says Queenie, leaning toward the shelf. “They have naa—”

“I didn’t mean to!” I blurt out, and she twists around to look at me in surprise, eyebrows raising. “It was _one time_ , and I didn’t mean to think about having hate sex with him, I just thought it was a _potential_ , because it happened _once_ when we were fighting and it’s not like I want a repeat or anything! It’s your parents’ house! Also, did you _also_ think the flowers were for him and not tell me anything? Because I didn’t know he was there, and everyone was being bitchy and not telling me anything, which is such a _bitch_ move, the flowers were definitely not for him, do you think _he_ thought the flowers were for him?

“Also, what right does _he_ have to be angry? _He_ ’s the one that had the audacity to cheat and then be all pissy when I cut him off, which he deserved— _deserves_ —and you know what? He doesn’t even get angry about rational stuff, anyway! Because this one time he got angry about me forgetting to recycle a toilet paper tube, which is a stupid thing, and why did it matter, because I _replaced the toilet paper_ , and so what if that led to, like, angry sex, it was only _two times_ , okay, and people can’t judge me because I bet they do it all the time; like, look at Ella, I bet she’s great at angry sex because she’s, like, always angry all the time, also about stupid things.

“Also, if Ella’s going gay, do you think I should go straight? Like, to keep the balance or something? I don’t know. Because I don’t think boobs are super attractive, but what if I didn’t experiment enough in high school? Or college?—In college, I’m in college, ha-ha. Should I? Jackie’s always talking about the greatness of pussy like it’s the eighth wonder of the world and maybe I’m missing out, and how am I supposed to know if I don’t have a desire to get with anyone anymore because they aren’t Michael? Because that’s a stupid-as-fuck reason and also probably just hypothetical, right, because I can totally get it up when I’m all by myself, and it’s not like I’m even purposefully thinking about the sex we used to have when I masturbate, sometimes it just _happens_ , and it’s an _accident_ , okay, sometimes when I’m too horny and a little bit pissed off I like to get slapped around more than usual, but that’s not even that often, it’s happened, like, _four_ times and that’s it!”

By the time I’m finished I’m breathing hard and sure my cheeks are scarlet.

Queenie’s eyebrows are by her hairline.

She puts the naan back on the shelf. “Well—”

“You know what? Never mind. Please forget I said all that.” Fuck, I’m going to wire my jaw shut so I can never speak again. I turn away at light speed and I would so totally run away from this conversation if my feet weren’t glued to the ground somehow, and I think I might either cry or puke.

“Lucky,” Queenie says gently, wrapping her hand around my forearm. “It’s okay.”

“It’s _not_!” I burst out. “It’s not, what’s wrong with me, why aren’t I _over_ him?”

Then she’s hugging me, like it doesn’t even matter that we’re in a public place and people are probably looking at us weird and I want to crawl into my skin and let the world eat me, so I don’t to endure being on the sharp end of so many stares anymore.

“He’s horrible,” I whisper into her boobs, so quietly that I’m not even sure that she hears, and for some reason, I feel like I’m trying to convince myself more than anyone else, because part of my stupid brain wants to insist that it probably _had_ just been a mistake, like Michael said, and he hadn’t meant to do it. Which, in turn, just makes me want to laugh and ask, so what, did he trip and his cock just happened to fall into her pussy?

“Oh, honey,” Queenie says. “Neither of you are horrible. You’re just two guys trying to figure out how to live, and sometimes life screws you over. That’s all.”

She pets my hair like we’re having a movie moment in the middle of a warehouse club, people parting past us like the Red Sea around Moses, their faces all blurry as they pass, characters in a rain-streaked painting.

“He’s hurting as much as you are, you know,” Queenie says to me. “He’s told us over and over to tell you that he didn’t do anything with that girl.”

“Right.” I laugh humorlessly and pull out of her arms.

“Lucky,” says Queenie sternly. “I know it sucks, but think about it. Okay? I’d be lying if I didn’t say he wants you back more than anything else. He’s a sad, sad man without you around.”

I grunt. “Sucks for him.”

“Sucks for you, too,” Queenie says lightly, adjusting her ravioli. “You’re a sad, sad man as well.”

“Well, I won’t be anymore, soon, because Jackie and Ella are going to _cure_ me of that.” I don’t say this without a healthy dose of sarcasm.

Queenie snorts. “Tell them to fuck off. Or say you don’t want to go. Don’t let them peer pressure you.”

“It’s not really peer pressure since all of you guys are older than me,” I mutter, but I don’t say anything else to defend my own honor, maybe because I don’t really not want to go. A lot of negatives, yeah, but I feel like the thought sums up my feelings fairly well: I don’t want to go but it’s not like going would be _horrible_. Like, it would take a lot of effort and yeah, I’d definitely rather finish the cabernet sauvignon in the fridge at home (half a bottle) and watch _Six_ until I pass out, but at the same time, I could probably get a lot drunker a lot faster off of Jägerbombs, especially if all it takes for someone else to buy me drinks is to grind on them a little. I could definitely do _that_ without feeling guilty about cheating on Michael, that’s for sure, especially since there’s nothing to feel guilty about since we _aren’t even in a relationship anymore_.

Queenie opens her mouth to say something else that’ll probably be a little judgmental, but I never get to hear it because Jackie rounds the corner with the cart and with a screech, a five-year-old that’s ecstatic at being left unsupervised, and accidentally crashes straight into her, making her stumble and yelp.

He immediately goes wide-eyed. “Oh my _god_ , Queenie! I’m so sorry, I didn’t know you were there, are you okay? Shit, I’m so—”

She rights herself with an indignant glare, as she is wont to do when us idiots are involved, and Jackie’s mouth shuts with a snap.

“Sorry,” he offers again, miserably, looking down into the cart basket, where Ella has abandoned her nest of jackets to do… who-knows-what, and now there’s actual groceries slowly piling up.

“ _Try_ to keep your mind about you when you’re hauling around a vehicle that you can use to harm other people,” Queenie sniffs, and stacks her ravioli neatly on top of the mess that’s sliding around in the cart basket.

“Ha-ha, I will. Sorry. Again. Sorry.” He glances at me and mouths, _Lucky! Want to get in the cart now?_

“Go away,” Queenie suggests, “and come back in five minutes. Lucky and I were having a tête-à-tête.”

Jackie pouts but accepts this as his consequence, morosely backpedaling out of the aisle, and I say good-bye from the one thing that could’ve saved me from talking about my _feelings_.

I consider running after him and launching myself into the cart, letting him run us around at high speeds until we crash into something.

“Lucky,” says Queenie, wrapping her hand around my bicep and flaying any thoughts of escape, “don’t stop yourself from living life just because you’re upset about what happened with Michael.”

“I’m not.”

“You are,” she said. “You both still have that in common, you know? Neither of you have stopped beating yourselves up for what happened that day.”

“I’m not _like_ him,” I snap.

“No, you’re not. You’re your own person, but you have so much in common. Like how you’re both stubborn asses. Now, I’m going to say something that’s gonna sound really rough, but hear me out: you have to let him go. Let him go or go and talk to him and work it out. You can’t keep going on clinging to this phantom idea you have about him, half-in and half-out of an imaginary relationship. Life doesn’t work that way, and you’ll pine away until you’re a husk and then _everyone_ will be sad, because we care about you, and we want to see you happy again. Yeah?”

I blink back tears and swallow thickly, looking away from her. “I _am_ happy,” I say.

We’re both silent, for a minute.

“I kept waiting,” I whisper eventually. “I kept waiting for him to come back and hold me and tell me it was all a mistake. But he never came.” I waited for him to use a different number to try and call me. I waited for him to yell at Bryce until Bryce handed over _his_ phone so he could talk to me. I waited for him to show up on my doorstep. Probably stupid, and probably too much like one of those crazy ex-girlfriends you hear straight people talking about, saying how they broke up because the men didn’t understand why their girlfriends expected them to read their minds. But I thought, y’know… maybe he’d put something other than work first, for once. Obviously I’d been wrong. I immediately hate myself for admitting this, because now everyone’s going to just think I’m more psycho than I already am.

“Oh, Lucky—”

“It’s fine!” I say roughly, swiping at my eyes. “It’s fine. I guess his _job_ just mattered more in the end. And you know what? That’s fine. I get it. Whatever. Money and stuff. That matters, right? Anyway, are we done here? Are we going to find the others? Maybe Jackie’s run over some more people. You’ll have to bail him out of Costco jail. Do they have a room here specifically for minor offenders? Costco seems like the kind of place where they’d just randomly have an interrogation room in the back, you know? Made of concrete, gray walls everywhere, harsh fluorescent lighting that looks bad in real life but’ll help you take the best photos that you’ve ever posted on Instagram.”

Queenie gazes at me sadly while I pointedly don’t look at her. “Lucky—”

“Come _on_ ,” I say impatiently, fastening my hand around her wrist and pulling her out of the aisle.

“Lucky—”

“What, what?”

“Do you miss him?” she asks, completely unprompted, and I flinch.

“What kind of stupid question is that?” I laugh. It’s so fake. Everything’s so fake.

“Do you miss him? And don’t lie.”

“Please,” I scoff. “Like you’d even know if I was lying.”

“I would. You’re jack shit at it,” she says, and I scowl.

“I don’t miss him at all,” I say, as convincingly as possible, and I must lie the shit out of that (I’m _so_ convincing! Queenie doesn’t know what she’s talking about), because she doesn’t press it, letting us walk (or, letting me drag her) in silence.

We find Jackie at the end of the book table, slumped over the cart, probably bored out of his mind, since he’s actually picked up a hardcover and is staring blindly at the inside of the jacket. As soon as he notices us, he perks up and practically chucks the book back onto the stacks on the table, jolting the cart so hard that the table it’s parked against rattles, making several other customers look at him

“Oh my god, _finally_ —”

“Where’re Jason and Ella?” Queenie asks.

“What did you do to _Lucky_?” Jackie yelps, letting go of his beloved cart to reach for me with devastating speed. “He looks all despondent! Did you _break_ him again?”

I let Jackie fold me up in his arms and trap me between himself and the cart handle while he glares at Queenie. He’s going at it backwards with the clothes, I think: first he was wearing a tank top outside last Sunday, and now that we’re _in_ side, he’s got on a puffy black jacket that is sinfully warm and I don’t have any qualms wrapping my hands beneath his back to take full advantage of his heat. I shove my nose into his chest, if only to hide my “despondent” face, but when I breathe in, it’s pure Axe, and I regret this action immediately as I nearly hack up a lung.

“I did nothing of the sort!” Queenie says, majorly offended. “He’s not _broken_.”

“You were talking about Michael, weren’t you?” Jackie accuses her, and I’m fairly sure she rolls her eyes in response.

“Where are Jason and Ella?” she repeats.

“Begone, thot! Go find them at the eggs.” Jackie hugs me tighter as I try to squirm out of his grip, gasping and flailing, to get a breath of something that isn’t pure synthetic sandalwood and sage.

Queenie snorts. “Please avoid wandering around so we don’t have to contact Interpol to find you. Also, you probably should let Lucky go before he starts clawing you. He looks like a recalcitrant cat.”

Jackie squeezes me tighter, making me release an embarrassing noise that is not entirely human in origin. “Lucky _loves_ me.”

“Starting… to… love you… a lot… less,” I wheeze, sinuses all clogged up. Fuck, I can _taste_ his body spray, and it’s so bitter and pungent that I’m sure my tongue is going to turn in its resignation letter.

He lets me go so quickly that I stumble backwards, nearly running into a man pushing a cart who gives me a dirty look.

“Sorry,” I mumble as he disappears, then glare at Jackie.

“Why are you looking at _me_ like that?”

Queenie’s nowhere in sight, so she’s likely already taken her leave.

“How much Axe are you _wearing_? Are you a teenage boy?”

“Lucky, I am not wearing _that much_ ,” he sniffs. “You’re just sensitive.”

“I resent that description of me,” I say, keeping a safe distance from him so I don’t start to go into anaphylactic shock; he, however, takes this as initiative to start chasing me with the cart, and we start to make a steady circle around the book table, going the opposite way as most other people and somehow nearly crashing into every other patron of Costco.

“What was Queenie telling you? Was she trying to get you back together with Michael?”

I open my mouth, ready to make some cutting remark about how I’d _heard_ them all in the kitchen, but I’m stopped by how upset he looks about it. “No,” I mutter.

He fidgets for a second, still leaning on the cart and following me around the table like a puppy. “I’m sorry,” he says eventually. “I didn’t know about—”

“It’s _fine_.”

“Why didn’t you tell us?” Jackie accuses. “It was going to be the happiest day of your life, and you didn’t tell any of us about it?”

“Well, look how it turned out,” I say, trying to be humorous but probably just mostly coming across as bitter.

“Lucky,” Jackie pouts. “Aren’t we _friends_? Don’t friends _tell_ each other things?”

I stare, unseeing, at a display of chocolates and Belgian cookies in the near distance. “Are we? Friends?” _Or are you just going to go running back to Michael as soon as he rings a gong and summons you all to his side? Because you’re always_ defending _him, even though he…_

“Of course we are,” he says, and there’s a lopsided tone to his voice that makes me look at him; _actually_ look at him; his face is twisted: a little pained and a little hurt, and I immediately feel bad for doubting him. For doubting all of them. “What, do you think we’ve just been _faking_ the past five years?”

I shrug, offhand, glancing away already, because looking at him right now is like looking at the sun, when your eyes get too watery and burnt if you stare for too long, and not-blinking only makes it worse.

“Lucky,” says Jackie, sounding more serious than I’ve ever heard him before. “You’re a cool guy. Just because you and Michael aren’t together anymore doesn’t change that. We’re not the kind of lame-ass shallow idiots that only hung out with you because you were dating him, and Mikey doesn’t have veto power over our social calendars, yeah? I think that’s been more than proved over the past two years.”

I swallow past the ball in my throat, because it _should_ have been proved, after all they’ve done; the calls and the gifts and the support. I hate that my brain still doesn’t fully trust them, even after five years, because I should _more_ than trust them, and I can _say_ that I trust them, but my mind will always be there in the background, whispering lies that they hate me and just can’t find a polite way to break off the dependent relationship I’ve forced on them since they probably think I’ll kill myself if they leave, which is likely more true than I’d like to admit, because… because I wouldn’t… _have_ anyone without them. And more people _can’t_ leave me, even if that means I’ve got to cling to the ones I’ve got left like a monkey with rice in its fists. It hurt enough when Mom died. When the thing with Michael… ended. I don’t know if I can go through that again, with _anyone_.

“And, in all honesty, you’re kind of more fun than Michael. I don’t know if you’ve gotten the memo, but all he does is work. Queenie found out a couple months ago that he was pulling sixteen-hour workdays in Japan and said if he didn’t stop, she was going to tell his company, because that’s illegal there, you know, you’re not supposed to work more than forty hours a week.”

I do know, and hate myself for the wave of worry that crests over me, because that can’t be healthy and Michael’s probably rocking a stress level that’s crazier than one of Elton John’s costumes. I immediately remind myself that I don’t care.

“He told you that?”

Clearly, my brain did not get the reminder.

“Um, no. He gradually stopped coming to calls so Queenie did a deep search on him and figured out what he was doing and WhatsApped him and said that if he didn’t pick up her next call, she was going to fly over to Japan and pull his scrotum over his head, so he called her when we were at the State Fair—when you and Ella and I were stealing the Hillary Clinton cut-out, remember?—and lo and behold, he looked like a ghoul and practically had Tory Burch bags under his eyes—at least that’s what Bryce said, I still have no idea what a ‘Tory Burch’ is—”

I snort.

“—and so she told him he better get his life together before she intervened. I guess he did, ’cuz then he was on our calls! Not when you were on. Obviously. And I don’t think he’s doing more than eight-hour workdays. At least, I assume so, because I _do_ think Queenie would narc on him if he was doing more than that.”

I nod, mindlessly listening and walking around, going down the aisle and then turning the corner and going down the next aisle, Jackie following, passing frozen spanakopita and battered halibut fillets.

“Kind of sucky that he doesn’t have a personality anymore,” rambles Jackie. “You know what _I_ think? I think he has daddy issues—”

I choke.

“—and he’s still trying to prove something to his fosters, that’s the reason why he was always competing with Bryce even though Bryce obviously didn’t care about competing with him at _all_ when they were still practically living the same lives, but he’s—Michael’s—got an inferiority complex or something that tells him that if he’s not the best at everything always, then he’s not good enough, and that’s unacceptable.”

“Wow, you’re a wonderful psychologist.”

He puffs out his chest. “I am, aren’t I? You should come to me with all your problems! What’re you struggling with mentally, right now, Lucky?”

“Nothing,” I say, because I don’t want to tell him. Jackie cannot keep his mouth shut, and five minutes after I said anything, he’d spill to Queenie, and then I would be screwed because she’d make me get my life together like she made Michael get his life together, and you know what? That’s one more difference that I can easily live with between Michael and me—he can have his wonderful, put-together existence, and I’ll be here, just… stealing way-too-many samples from the Costco ladies at the end of the aisles and sleeping for eighteen hours a day.

“ _Lucky_! But I’m your _friend_ , I want to _help_ you—”

“I don’t really need help with my life right now.”

“That’s what all the _emo_ kids say, I’m _awesome_ with emo kids, come on—”

“Well,” I say, an evil, evil idea forming in my head as we round another corner. “Actually, there is something that’s been on my mind… I don’t know if _you_ ’ve heard, but Collie tells me that she’s been kind of seeing someo—”

“Oh! You know what? We don’t need to talk about what you’re worried about if you really don’t want to,” Jackie decides hastily. “That’s fine. Really, I insist. We must keep your comfort in mind, after all, you delicate thing. Oh look! Here’s everyone else! They’re still arguing over eggs because they’re plebs—”

“Jackie!” complains Queenie while I sputter that I’m not _delicate_ , what the hell.

“Ugh, finally, the _cart_ ,” says Ella, dumping a carton of eggs in while Jason yelps at her to be careful, making her stand on the little platform under the cart so she can reach in and adjust the position of the groceries.

“—and I’ve just remembered that I need. Um. Soap! Laundry detergent. Excuse me. Ladies, gentlemen.” Jackie makes a sharp U-turn and takes off with Ella still standing on the cart, half-in and half-out of the basket, squawking.

“Oh, Jesus Christ,” says Queenie, exasperated, holding another egg carton and beating feet after them, leaving me and Jason to stare at each other.

“What the heck was _that_?” Jason says eventually, bewildered. “Colleen’s seeing someone?”

“Um. No?”

He blinks at me.

“I don’t think so? Mentioned in passing, she mentioned it in passing, I definitely don’t have any details,” I say with more panic than is probably warranted, considering Jason’s look of confusion. “I mean, I don’t even know what’s going on! Ha-ha.”

Jason shoots me another odd look, turns to stare at the eggs, and then stares at me again. “Do _you_ need eggs?”

“Um. No. I don’t like eggs,” I remind him. Well. Egg _whites_. Yolks are fine, but egg whites are the bane of the universe because they’re so jiggly and tasteless and they also stink when you cook them. Michael, because he’s the devil incarnate, had _liked_ egg whites and hated yolks, which worked out great while we were dating because then we could do splitsies, but now… I just don’t eat eggs anymore, because Dad doesn’t really want to eat only whites for the rest of eternity, and there certainly isn’t anyone _else_ in the house who’s going to be eating them.

He nods as if telling himself he should’ve already known this, and puts a hand on my shoulder to steer me away from standing in front of the big glass doors. I see the blank faces of strangers as we move toward the bread.

“Are you going to take advantage of this moment to drop some life-changing advice on me, too?” I ask him.

“Um, do you want that?”

“Not really.”

“Oh good,” says Jason, taking his phone out of his pocket and glancing at it as it buzzes several times in succession. “I’m not good at giving life-changing advice. I mostly just give mediocre advice, like ‘eat your vegetables’ and ‘go to sleep before midnight.’ Also, I’m a little stressed. Michael hasn’t stopped texting me since three in the morning. You’d think he’d be jet-lagged enough to pass out by nine in the morning, but no. It’s like he doesn’t even _care_ about his sleep schedule. His excuse is that he’s young, but _I_ keep telling him that next year, thirty is going to punch him in the face, and he’s going to have a lot of fun not being able to function on any less than six hours of sleep, and _especially_ not if he stays up every night drinking like a monster.”

“Ah,” I say, because apparently I can’t escape the Michael conversation no matter where I go, though I have to admit that I’m not really trying that hard to avoid it, since I’m not currently immediately ditching Jason. I want to ask: _When did he get back? Why didn’t any of you tell me? Please tell me he’s not staying, even if it’s a lie. Please tell me he’s staying._

“He got back last Saturday,” Jason says, swiping through some stuff on his screen, having picked up a talent for mind-reading lately. He frowns at something, then looks at me in a way that makes me want to ask, _What?_ “I didn’t… know he was going to be at lunch.”

I bob my head and look away. “Yeah, I figured. It’s fine.” I laugh a little, but I’m pretty sure it’s fake.

“Jesus, Michael, shut up,” Jason mutters at his phone, stabbing the keypad a bit, and then shoves it back in his pocket. “Okay, laundry detergent,” he says. “We need to catch up with everyone else. Queenie hasn’t been alone with Jackie for going on two years, and he’s going to drive her to do something she normally wouldn’t, like commit first-degree murder.”

“Um, they have Ella.”

“Oh, right!” says Jason, cheering up immensely and turning right around. “Let’s grab some flour and sugar, then. Queenie’s been going on another baking rampage recently. I think it’s her way of expressing joy about being back in the U.S. and being able to _not_ have to measure every single ingredient on a scale before she uses it.”

I let him guide me around since knows how to navigate a Costco better than me.

We get the flour. Ten pounds.

We get the sugar. Another ten pounds.

Jason’s so quiet that I don’t know whether to fall to my knees, crying, to thank god for this small mercy; or scream at him to just say something, because I can’t live for that long with just my thoughts to occupy me, and they’re busy trying to deduce what the hell Michael was texting Jason about at _three in the morning_. Had it been about me? It had probably been about me. If I’d been in his situation, I probably would also be texting my friends wildly, getting absolutely smashed to hide the dank recesses of my broken heart. Not that Michael _has_ a heart. If he did, why the fuck had that girl been there?

 _And what if he’s telling the truth?_ the tiniest part of me whispers (and still hopes, like a moron), _About not doing anything with her?_

 _That_ idea just makes me feel like shit because that means I’ve just been inexplicably being an asshole to him for two years, and I don’t want that on my conscience, so I ignore it completely and fully, following Jason a little desperately as he walks, trying to beam him the thought to start some conversation, like perhaps telling me where Michael’s staying so I can get started on my swift and concrete plans to avoid the fuck out of him so he doesn’t have any more chances to whine that he’s not the person in the wrong, here. Jason’s mind-reading must have very strict conditions to work, however, because he doesn’t say anything.

We make it to the end of the aisle and start making our way over to the laundry detergent, which is near the toilet paper—at least until Jason gets distracted by dragon fruit, and then I end up lingering at the end of the aisle, stealing too many samples when nobody’s looking, because I’m pretty sure it’s polite to only take one but I’m fucking starving to death in a place that’s _selling food_.

Of course, because life cannot give me a break, I turn around in between shoving pieces of hot dog in my mouth and get met with Queenie’s chest, making me squeak and jump backwards.

“Lucky,” she snaps, “you are not so poor that you need to start making a meal out of Costco hand-outs.” She glares and, for a second, I’m petrified that she knows everything—every little secret that I hadn’t meant to turn into a secret—and she’s going to tell everyone, and they’re going to descend on me like sharks on chum.

Then Queenie looks away to where Jason is somewhere behind me, her Medusa-like stare disappearing and letting me swallow and wheeze in a breath that is so loud and relieved that a passing random looks at me weird, and then she turns her glare onto the innocent old lady behind the little stand—who’s not even paying attention to us because we’re five customers among millions—like it’s _her_ fault that I’m scrounging little hot dog pieces like they’re my last meal on Earth.

“We’re going to my place after, so don’t bother eating.”

I want to ask if she actually means her _parents’_ place, because no offense to her parents at all, but I don’t really want to see them ever again after the absolute embarrassment that was last week’s brunch. They probably think I’m insane. Or, that all of us are insane. Which is probably not far from the truth.

Also—what if Michael’s there? What if Michael is _staying_ there?! I hadn’t seen his car on Sunday! What if this is an obscure plan for them to nudge us together again despite the fact that they’ve all been groveling and saying they’re sorry and all that crap?

If he’s there, I decide, I’ll just do like Ella said and chop his balls off.

“You don’t need to feed me,” I mutter, cramming the last hot dog piece in my possession into my mouth. I toss the little paper soufflé cup into a nearby trashcan lined with a black bag.

Queenie turns her Tiger Mom Look on me again and I swallow the hot dog before I’m finished chewing and almost choke. I feel like Chica from Unus Annus’s _Hot Dog’d to Death_ video. Christ. Can I sink any lower?

 _You could get on your knees_ , my brain reminds me, unhelpfully. _Like that girl. In Japan. With Michael. Remember that? Lucky. Lucky! Hey, remember that? That girl? In Japan? With Michael?_

 _Yeah, too well_ , I snap. _Also, you’re not being helpful. Go away and come back when I need the euro-to-dollar conversion of the cost of three eight-point-three-ounce Texas Red grapefruits._

My brain laughs at me while I pray that Michael is only here as a stopover before he goes somewhere else famous and far away, like Paris or Rome.

“Where’s Jackie?” Jason asks, coming in to save me (thank god) with several bags of frozen fruit under his arms.

“Still cowering by the Clorox,” says Queenie, and then raises her eyebrows at me in that way that says, _Care to explain?_ “Lucky?”

“Don’t look at me,” I mumble.

Queenie snorts fondly. “Well. Not exactly _cowering_ , and perhaps more trying to cajole Ella into riding in the cart so he can push her around, while she beats him over the head with a pack of Swiffers. It seems to be getting him over whatever trauma he’s just experienced.”

“Oh dear,” says Jason.

“No, he definitely deserves it,” says Queenie. She offers me her arm and I wrap my hand around her elbow, letting her take us out of the aisle to where Ella is busy attempting manslaughter where Jackie will be her first and only victim.

“Um,” I say, when Jason takes the lead by several steps. “Question. Not that this is related to anything at all.”

“Mm-hm?”

“So, um, Michael—”

 _Fuck, fuck, fuck_ , I curse myself in my head, _can I not_ not _talk about him for_ five seconds _?_

“—uhhh, where’s he…”

“He bought a house.” Queenie takes mercy on me, but now that she’s said the magic words, I kind of wish she hadn’t because…

Because what she’s said means he’s staying _for real_ , and I feel my stomach drop out from under me.

I wonder if there’s any chance that _I_ can move.

Then I consider the fact that I have a grand total of a couple hundred dollars in my bank account and that probably isn’t enough to buy me a ticket to the middle of nowhere, Russia, even if it was a one-way trip.

“You live over ten miles apart,” Queenie assures me, but I notice that she doesn’t tell me exactly _where_ he’s situated. That’s probably a good thing, so I don’t turn up at his house out of the blue and vandalize his perfect walls by egging his siding or something. The urge is minimal, but there. Maybe I just need to throw something. I haven’t thrown anything in a long time, and everyone knows it’s a requirement to stay healthy, if you are a gay man, to throw something and be a dramatic bitch at least once a month.

“Okay. Uh, cool,” I say, something funky going on with my voice and making it come out all high-pitched and wobbly, which Queenie is nice enough not to comment on. Either that or she’s too busy lunging forward to confiscate a bottle of Tide that Ella’s swinging at Jackie’s crotch, while at the same time trying to stop him from slamming the cart straight into Ella’s side.

“NO!” scolds Queenie, as if Jackie and Ella are particularly naughty dogs, and I hasten into the next aisle, nearly walking into a towering stack of toilet paper, because I need to Forget About Michael immediately and I don’t know how to make that happen while we’re surrounded by his— _our_ friends.

Shit, fuck, shit, fuck, ten words and I’m falling apart.

 _Go back to Japan!_ I want to beg him. I want to laugh at the irony of it: three years ago, I would’ve been pining in my room because he _wasn’t_ in Minnesota.

I’m three seconds from turning around and finding Jackie so I can beg his forgiveness for being a little bitch and then beg him to distract me—if getting driven around is still a viable option when there’s groceries in the basket—when he appears around the corner at light speed, nearly running me over because somehow, he’s managed to retain possession of the cart despite ample evidence that it should have been taken away from him by now.

“Lucky, Lucky, get in! Let’s see if we can do donuts in this thing.”

And that’s how we get kicked out of the Maple Grove Costco.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Dear readers that have been around for a while (new readers can ignore this), you might have noticed some continuity errors in what you’ve been reading. That’s because I’m shit at writing and have changed Lucky’s age no less than six times since first coming up with this story (did you know he was originally going to be 25???). Anyway, sorry. I’ve finally reached a consensus with myself and written out a timeline, and I’ve been going back and fixing these errors in previous chapters, so in case you’re still confused about what the fuck is going on because something I posted recently Does Not Add Up with something you read in the past, here’s some run-downs to make this clear for once and for all:  
> Lucky is 22, going on 23. He dropped out of university shortly after his mother died but if he had stayed, he would be graduating in June. Yes, I am aware this means he would have a 5-year college experience. Not everyone graduates in 4 years and that’s O.K. (Edited in C5.)  
> Collie is also 22 going on 23. While in college, she left for Senegal as part of a student exchange program, liked it, and decided to stay and complete university there. She graduated the previous June and has recently returned from shadowing an international teacher in Kazakhstan. She is back in MN to work on getting her teaching license. (Edited in C1 and C2.)  
> Thank you for your time, have a great February, if u bang someone on Valentine's Day make sure you get COVID (and STD) tests first and don't have an orgy; the rest of us lonely jerks will be doing shots at the metaphorical bar <3


	7. I Make a Mistake and Accidentally Seduce White Cock

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The chapters keep getting LONGER, I'm SORRY, I don't know how to make it STOP *sobs*
> 
> Also, heads-up, porn incoming, sorry if it's trash, I literally just wrote this entire chapter in the past three days (procrastination gang) while I was trying not to die from stress nausea that I wouldn't get it out on time, cheers

I don’t know why I ever went along with this. Currently, I am sandwiched between Ella and Bryce _on a bus_ because apparently nobody could bother to call a _cab_ , as my friends still live in the nineteen hundreds and had insisted that the _hours_ it would take to get from my house to The Saloon via _public transport_ would “build character” and “allow us to bond,” whatever the fuck _that_ had meant.

There _will_ be taxis involved when going back home; I’d made that nonnegotiable after half an hour on this stupid bus. It’ll be so much easier to get back to our own houses—or, since Ella and Bryce have made it very clear that they’re here to get _Laid_ with a capital ‘L,’ to _other_ peoples’ houses. Though I do _not_ plan on getting _Laid_ with a capital ‘L,’ they’ve already told my dad not to phone the police if I don’t come home tonight: (“Hi Mr. Sommers! Yeah, we’re here to take Lucky out.” (Bryce.) “Are you lovely folks going to dinner? He hasn’t eaten yet tonight.” (Dad.) “No sir,” (Ella, cheerfully), “the plan is to get him a fat dong to bounce on until he can’t walk straight anymore.”) I’d almost kicked them out and refused to go. Dad had thought it hilarious. I had not. Humiliation threatens to end my life every time I think about stepping back in the house and facing him. This isn’t to say I don’t _want_ to go home; on the contrary, I would very much like to return to bed, though I doubt that this is a thing that’s going to happen, because:

“Lucky, do you like beards?” Ella asks.

“No.”

“Oh my god,” moans Bryce, exasperated, “I’ve told you this a million times, just use _Michael_ as a starting point. Has Michael ever had a beard in his _life_? No, he hasn’t!”

“Well, I’m sorry that I didn’t meet him until college,” she sniffs. “Who knows what he was up to in high school? And I thought the whole point of this is that we’re _not_ getting Lucky another version of Michael.”

It’s a small mercy that the bus is practically empty: the only other people on right now are an old couple way at the front and the bus driver herself. God knows if had been _more_ crowded, I would’ve thrown myself out the window already and wailed at Bryce and Ella to just let me get run over on N 7th Street.

“I almost wish,” I say to myself, “that Jackie was here right now.” It would’ve toned down all the Gay, at least; but _nooo_ , Jackie had to bail, because apparently his ‘thing’ that ended at nine hadn’t ended at all, and I’m actually fairly sure that this ‘thing’ is hanging out with Collie, though I’m _know_ they’re doing more than just _hanging out_ , but I can’t _do_ anything about it because neither of them are answering their texts (but I guess I deserve that) and I’m currently on a MetroTransit bus going _at least_ fifty miles per hour down a thirty mph road because the bus driver had woken up and decided to have crazy juice with her eggs and bacon this morning. Or maybe she had too much coffee. Either way, I’m not exactly positive that I’m not about to die right now, but at least if I die, I won’t have to suffer through any more of:

“Lucky, I realize I may have made some assumptions earlier today, and for that I am sorry. Would a hunk suffice, or are you a twink that is attracted to other twinks? Also, as a side note that is also a relevant detail, are you a top or a bottom?”

“I’m not a twink,” I say.

“He’s a switch,” says Bryce. “I don’t think he likes twinks, though. He’s very critical of them. I think he sees them as competition instead of prey. Either that or he just has a kink for railing men bigger than him. Add it to the list.”

“I’m not a twink,” I snap again.

“Of course not,” placates Ella, patting me on the head.

The bus driver takes a harrowing, screeching turn onto Ramp A/7th Street Station and I get launched into Bryce’s lap.

“He’s also a masochist,” says Bryce, as we try to untangle ourselves. “One time when _they_ were still together, Michael texted me something that was obviously not meant for my eyes, and it had something to do about spanking someone with a riding crop until—”

“Bryce,” I say sweetly, because my hands are on his balls and I _will_ rip them off, “shut the fuck up.” I, tragically, know exactly what text he’s talking about because Michael had sent me approximately fifty messages about it at the time, each one with increasing franticness, and when I had called him for the sole purpose of laughing at him, he snapped at me to _stop laughing_ or he was going to make my ass _purple_ when he got home, which made me laugh _harder_ and ask him if he was sure he didn’t want to make _Bryce_ ’s ass purple, because I was sure Bryce would bruise easier than me; by the end of the conversation, both of us were laughing so hard we couldn’t breathe. It _used_ to be a good memory, and now it’s… now it’s just a trash one because I want that back. Not Michael, obviously, because Michael is an asshole, but that kind of easy familiarity with someone: joking around with them and knowing they’re always going to be there to talk to; laugh with and cry with and just… talk with.

“Why?” Bryce smirks. He shoves me back into my own seat without mentioning that my hand had been on his junk (accidentally!).

“Ella,” I snap, “you couldn’t have called _anyone_ else?”

“Who did you want me to call?” she asks; we’re flung to our feet as the bus grinds to a very abrupt stop.

“Fuck, this lady drives worse than Bryce,” I mutter, and he cuffs me on the back of the head, making me growl at him.

“Look at our friend group, Lucky. The only sluts are Jackie and Bryce. Jackie is currently busy. Ergo: Bryce.”

“You could’ve called someone who _isn’t_ a slut,” I say as they shove me out of the bus.

“They wouldn’t have been able to help,” Ella sniffs. “Honestly, use your _logic_. We’re going to a club, so obviously we need to bring with us someone who is experienced at clubbing.”

“Or we could’ve just figured it out for ourselves.”

“Honey, if we came by ourselves, I would be going home with a handsome woman in five minutes and you would spend the entire night getting so drunk that when you finally stepped out of the place, you’d keel over and die in the gutter.”

“That’s what’s going to happen anyway,” I tell her as they frog-march me three blocks over to The Saloon, the cold air not helping them sober up from whatever crazy they’re currently infected with.

“No,” she says. “If I see that you aren’t making an effort to seduce anyone, I’m going to send Bryce over.”

 _For what?_ I want to snort. _So I can have sex with_ him _?_ “Won’t you be too busy to be watching me?” I ask sweetly.

“Oh, don’t worry about me,” she says, just as sweet. “Lucky for you—ha-ha, get it?—I’m very good at multitasking.”

“How wonderful.”

They shove me in the door and hand over their IDs and the cover fee to the bouncer; Bryce coughs up my driver’s license from where he squirreled it away after I tried to throw it out the bus window (it had been a long ride). We go through the usual routine of the bouncer squinting at me to make sure I am not, in fact, sixteen, while I roll my eyes. When he finally lets us through, Bryce and Ella shove me past the door quickly, as if he might change his mind.

“Can I have my ID back?”

“Do you need it?”

“Yes,” I say, squirming out of their grips and grabbing the little rectangle of plastic before Bryce can dodge me. “I’m going to go seduce someone at the bar. Cheers.”

“Sounds like a disaster,” murmurs Ella; I nearly don’t hear her over the scream of people and music, which is incredibly loud and making me wish I was deaf. There’s a reason I don’t go out anymore, and part of that reason is that I no longer vibe with loud drunk people. I feel like such an old man. Urgh.

Bryce waves cheerfully, like he’s never heard the word ‘deception’ before in his life. “Okay! Have fun!”

I leave them behind on the dance floor.

I’m more than a little buzzed by the time Bryce finds me, and honestly I’m surprised it took him so long, considering I’ve made exactly zero effort to whore myself out: I have had two shots and also a weird, fruity cocktail that some stranger had ordered for me, though I didn’t even look his way when the bartender had told me that, which is probably rude, but I’m not in a place where I can muster the energy to care. I am drunk enough that everything is fuzzy and slightly warm, and currently I have my nose buried in another shot, not having drunk it quite yet, just allowing the sharp scent of alcohol to worm its way up into my sinuses and make me blink watery eyes, because hopefully this will deal with my burgeoning horniness (that always rears its ugly head when I get drunk) so _I_ don’t have to deal with it.

“Hello, Lucky,” says Bryce, shoving himself into my side, making several people shoot him nasty glares as he knocks them out of the way, but Bryce has never cared about the way anybody looks at him, unless it’s with lust, and I wish I could be that obtuse.

“What do you want?” I do the shot and am classy enough that I _don’t_ slam the glass down afterwards.

“Ella is _concerned_ …”

“I want another shot,” I say, to nobody in particular.

“I think you should have some water,” Bryce says, waving away the bartender, and I glare at him. “You’re drinking like you want to kill yourself. Should I be worried? Ella is. Ella’s concerned about the drinking _and_ the fact that you’re not making good on your promise.”

“I never made any promises,” I mutter.

“Fine. But there were _expectations_ when we came here.”

“I literally told you that I was going to walk in here and get absolutely smashed. I don’t know what else you were _expecting_.”

Bryce is silent long enough that when I look up at him, he’s frowning, his eyebrows furrowed together, making little lines at the center of his forehead. Of course, he still looks good even like that, because Bryce always looks good, which is unfair. Whenever I start thinking particularly hard about something, my nose wrinkles up and I purse my lips and overall I look like I’m trying to push out an enormous shit that is refusing to get out of my butthole.

“This is sad behavior, Lucky,” Bryce eventually says. “Your breakup was _two years_ ago. You’re behaving like me the _day_ after one of my breakups. That is unacceptable.”

“You dated people?” I can’t help myself from snarking, and he scowls.

“I know your nastiness is fueled by misery and so I am not going to lower myself to reacting to that,” he sniffs.

“And what, the cure to my sadness is to sit on someone’s dick?” I stare across the bar at some white dude who’s leaning up against the counter, his sleeves rolled up, eyeing me and Bryce; we’re plastered so close together that I can’t tell who he’s looking at. I hope it’s not me. It’s not that he’s not hot, I guess he could be attractive, but I’m so not in the mood for getting it on with a complete stranger.

“Horniness generally works pretty well as a temporary cure to everything,” Bryce says mildly.

“Says you.”

“Says I!” he exclaims, spreading his hands wide and flashing an irritatingly disarming grin that punches me in the face. “My words should come with, like, _extra_ merit, since I’ve tested out that hypothesis multiple times.”

“Like, what, in Toronto?” A curl of _something_ slides through me, and it’s unpleasant—like an eel slithering up my stomach to inject my throat with venom.

“Exactly,” he says, slapping the bartop. “Did you know, while I was there, there was this other dude I was doing a shoot with—his name was Alfonso— _Alfonso_ —and his dick was curved _wickedly_ to the left, and lemme tell you, it was definitely one of the best things I’ve ever sat on.”

“Jesus fucking Christ.”

“That’s definitely what I was screaming that night,” he says with satisfaction. He waves the bartender over and orders something; when the bartender looks at me, Bryce drags me into his armpit to hide my face. “No, not him,” he says. “I’ll pay you fifty dollars not to sell him another drink tonight.”

“Bryce!” I try to bite him and mostly just end up with cloth.

The bartender laughs. “That your boyfriend?”

“Absolutely _not_ ,” says Bryce, not without leering, because the bartender is young, tall, and very scantily clad; he’s also leanly muscled in that way men are when they have good genes and are also between the age of twenty-one and twenty-five and work out sometimes—but not in a high-class gym; in their own basement, where they do pushups and sit-ups every day because they have a home training app on their phone and pay thirty-nine ninety-nine a year for a personalized workout plan. He’s making me very aware that I _don’t_ look like that. I’m kind of soft around the middle and whenever I wear underwear with tight waistbands, they cut a little dent into my waist, which makes me way-too-self-conscious to ever take my shirt of in front of everyone, because I’m pretty sure Chinese men are supposed to be thin as fuck and have muscles harder than rocks if they’re also going to be short, and I am _not_ thin as fuck, but I’m also too lazy to exercise.

I elbow Bryce in the side and he finally lets go of me so I no longer have to inhale his choking cologne, which smells like pepper and cinnamon and makes me want to sneeze.

“Thank you!” he says when he gets his blue shot.

“What’s that?”

“It doesn’t matter,” Bryce says, downing it so fast I’m tempted to call him a hypocrite and waving the bartender over again so he can gesture for another.

The bartender slides over two with a salacious smile. “Courtesy of the gentleman,” he says, jerking his chin over to the white guy across the bar.

Bryce twists around with renewed interest, a sly grin sliding onto his face; he does the shots one right after another, making lascivious (obnoxious) eye contact with the guy the whole time.

“Gross. Stop staring at him like that while you’re plastered all over me.”

“Why, are you jealous? It’s unbecoming of you.”

I elbow him in the side until he yelps and is forced away from the bar. “Go away. Go blow him in the bathroom or something.”

“A very tempting thought. Care to join? We could have a threesome. I’d even bottom for you if you wanted. I bet you’re secretly a power top.”

“You’re fucking disgusting.”

Bryce laughs and slides away easily. “Join ussssss, Luckyyyyy,” he hisses, breath warm against my ear, his hand sliding slowly along my arm, sending goosebumps racing up my skin and heat pooling in my crotch for some absurd fucking reason. I chalk this up to being touch-starved.

“Go the fuck away,” I say, ignoring him and ignoring my feelings, and ordering another shot.

He presses a sticky, alcoholic kiss to my cheek that has me shivering, chuckles, and melts away. The man across the bar is gone, too, and I am left once more to be a lonely bastard with my liquor.

“Not here for the company?” Bryce’s bartender asks when he hands over my drink.

“No.”

He looks like he wants to ask something else—like maybe, what’s Bryce’s number—but he gets called away, mercifully, before he can.

I do my shot and try not to think about what Michael must be doing right now.

Is he at his house (seriously, a _house_? Fuck him and fuck the current state of the housing market), watching TV? Or cooking? He used to like cooking, he said it helped him relax. He always did it so carefully: the stupid _mise en place_ thing and cleaning up as he went and stuff like that. I’d always just do everything as it needed to be done, and he’d get frustrated at me when I was in his kitchen because I wasn’t “doing it right,” to which I’d snap back that there wasn’t such a thing as cooking correctly as long as you made edible food, which I _had been doing_ , even if sometimes you had to pick off a couple burnt spots sometimes, and also occasionally shit was too spicy or too salty or something like that, and the pots and pans needed _hella_ scrubbing after. Though, I guess I have to give Michael credit that he never complained about the food itself.

Whatever, though, it’s not like it _matters_ anymore.

He’s probably not cooking. It’s fucking late, who cooks at, like, ten? Maybe he’s sleeping. Or texting me some more. I’d left my phone at home, charging, which has the potential to be disastrous. Someone’ll take me home and then murder me, and no one’ll find out until I fail to show up for three consecutive brunches (they’ll all think I’m skipping because I don’t want to see Michael), and Dad will probably just think I’ve found a silver fox to mooch moolah off of (or that I’m staying with friends) and he’ll be relieved I’m not around to annoy him anymore, and then one day in the future, both parties will call each other and realize that I haven’t been in contact with either of the other; in the meantime, a massive police investigation will have been launched because they’ll have found the body of an anonymous man in someone’s closet, his skin ripped off so a suit could be made out of it, and _then_ —

“Lucky,” someone whispers in my ear and I squawk unattractively, whipping around to see Bryce, brutally yanked out of my death fantasy.

“Oh, for fuck’s sake,” I snap, pressing a hand to my racing heart. “Why are you back already, was the sex sub-par? Could you not get it up with the smell of turds floating around you?”

“My god, you are _cranky_ ,” says Bryce fondly, shoving in behind me and plastering me to the bar. I think I can feel his erection against my back, which _I_ think is disgusting and my brain thinks is titillating. He waves wildly until a new bartender comes over. “I don’t remember you being a cranky drunk. You used to be a very giggly drunk. A very sexual one, too, now that I think about it. There’d been a lot of public indecency when you were around Michael. Remember when the two of you got kicked out of 19 Bar? I’m glad he’s not here right now.”

Yeah, there had been a lot of public indecency because Michael had a fantastic cock and sometimes it was more important that I was touching it instead of just staring at it.

“Can you try to not get me arrested for implied underage drinking?” I say before my mouth can puke this out. “Go bother someone else. Like Ella. I’m sure she would appreciate your meddling far more than me.”

“I can’t. She left.”

“She _left_?”

“She had a grand total of two cocktails, found a stunning young lady with the most wonderful platinum-blonde bob who seemed just as enamored, loudly announced to three strangers that she was about to get her clit licked until it fell off, and then called an Uber. All this happened approximately seven minutes ago.”

“Jesus fuck,” I say, because it’s the only appropriate response to being told something like that.

“I _know_. How does she do it so quickly and confidently?” he says, as if he isn’t capable of the exact same thing (as if he hasn’t _done_ it, multiple times). His breath is hot on the back of my neck and sending tingles down my spine.

“No idea.” I plop my chin in my hand and stare across the bar as Bryce gets waited on by the muscle twink bartender.

“Oh, come on,” says Bryce, swirling his drink. “Stop being despondent. You’re young and hot and have good teeth. Go find someone!”

He makes as if to shove me off my perch and I growl at him, promising a very swift death if he does this.

“You’re such a sad man, Lucky,” he sighs, wrapping an arm around my midsection, his fingers curling firmly around my side as he lifts his drink to his lips.

“Thank you for the verdict, doctor.”

“You’re welcome.” He swallows and hooks his chin over my shoulder, blowing out a warm breath by my ear; he’s draped over my back like a blanket. I like his weight.

“Seriously, don’t you have anything better to do?”

“No,” says Bryce. “I’m being a dedicated supervisor to make sure you don’t die tonight.”

“I’m not going to die.”

“The amount of alcohol you’ve consumed says otherwise. How many shots have you had? Seven? Eight? You should stop, I think that’s the max number of drinks someone your size is supposed to have before they fucking die.”

“The max is _nine_ , and I’ve only had five. You’re shit at counting.”

“It’s one of my flaws,” he sighs dramatically, and when someone else jams in close to the bar, he gets squeezed even closer to me, driving the breath out of my lungs as my solar plexus get rammed into the counter.

I try to elbow him viciously. “Can you _not_? I can’t _breathe_.”

“Not my fault,” Bryce says, and he downs the rest of his drink.

“Go away,” I say. “I can feel your erection from here. It’s fucking gross.”

To his credit, Bryce shifts his hips back. “I don’t have an erection.”

“Tell that to your penis. Go find your white man.”

“I don’t want to.”

“Is he not good enough for you?”

“He mentioned watersports and I left so fast I’m surprised I didn’t break the sound barrier.”

I squint at the bar, my mind hazy for a second. “Like… peeing?”

“Oh _no_ ,” says Bryce, horrified. “Are you using that tone of voice because that’s something you used to do with Michael? _Lucky_!” he wails. “I am not one to kink shame, but if your kink is piss, shame on you! How _could_ you?”

“I didn’t let him pee on me!” I hiss, twisting around to punch him in the ribs. “Can you lower your fucking _voice_? I don’t need random strangers here thinking I’m willing to be a human urinal!”

Bryce chokes on his drink and coughs violently, having to lunge forward and slam his glass on the bartop so he doesn’t spill it down my shirtfront; several people turn and raise their eyebrows.

“Thanks a fucking lot,” I mutter, leaning back against his chest to hide from their questioning gazes: even if you’re blackout drunk, there are some words and phrases that’ll break through the haze to attract your attention and ‘human urinal’ is probably one of them.

He wheezes, breath rattling in his lungs. “That was—that was _your_ fault—”

“You started it.”

“ _You_ started it, you asked about the Pee Man!”

“And so what, you’ll invite me to an orgy and not let someone pee on you a little? Urine is pretty close to sterile, you know, right when it comes out of your body.”

“Never say _orgy_ again. I fucking hate that word. It’s so ugly—”

“Orgy,” I say immediately, and he smacks the side of my head, making the room swirl abruptly in a kaleidoscope of lights.

“—And you can go get peed on if you want, but I am not letting anyone… _release_ their _waste_ onto me, that’s just _nasty_ —”

“Have you seen _Bonding_ on Netflix? Brendan Scannell gets asked to pee on this side character named Fred. I wouldn’t want to get peed on by Brendan Scannell,” I say, while Bryce wails loudly and with vigor. “I’d rather get peed on by Zoe Levin. Even though I’m not attracted to women, I objectively think she’s a lot hotter than he is.”

“I hate you _so much_ ,” Bryce wheezes.

“You good, bro?” I ask.

“Get that smirk off your face, you smug asshole, I am _not good_ , I’ll repeat I am _not good_ , call a fucking _ambulance_ to take me home.”

“Are you going to be paying for that? I’m not spending a thousand-plus dollars on you.”

“All my friends are _cruel_ ,” Bryce moans, the epitome of melodrama, as usual. “ _Cruel_ and _cheap_.”

“You can cope,” I tell him sweetly, and steal his drink.

“I really _can’t_.”

Despite his whining, he wraps both his arms around me and leans into my back, humming along to the song that’s pounding on the speakers. He doesn’t even complain about me finishing his drink, and I’m irritated at how complacent at how that is, so I lean back as much as I can against his broad chest and fist my hand in his hair, yanking him over so I can yell right in his ear.

“I told you to get your fucking erection off me!”

“God,” he yells back, “I won’t fucking need to, you’re making my dick shrivel up right back into my body, the way you talk to me!”

“Fantastic!” I shove him away and he giggles, nearly tripping into some stranger and batting his eyes as soon as he sees them, blessing them with a smile that’s probably melting off their underwear. They check him out blatantly and grin back.

Disgusting.

I turn away. Bryce disappears with his new man onto the dance floor somewhere, and I try valiantly to recapture the attention of the bartender.

If Michael were here, we’d probably be having fantastic drunk sex right about now. Or, actually, probably not, because Michael’s such a stickler for the rules that he refused to do anything with me except cuddle after I’d had so much as two drinks, because he said my ‘integrity’ was ‘compromised’ and consent wasn’t really consent if I was too blasted out of my mind to do anything but giggle and paw at his cock.

Fuck him.

He’s such a pretentious asshole.

Sometimes a guy just needs a dick in them when they’re really fucking smashed.

And I don’t _giggle_.

I almost want to text him about it and my hand makes it all the way to the pocket of my jeans before I remember that I left my phone at home.

Fucking fantastic.

“LUCKY!” yells Bryce, jamming himself back against my side just as I do my next shot, making me choke on it, and I wonder if it counts as drinking if the majority of the alcohol goes up my nose and not down my throat.

“Oh my _god_ , what the fuck do you want _now_?”

He smacks on the back a couple times until my body stops attempting to eject my lungs from my mouth.

“What happened to your new boytoy?” I snap, clearing my throat viciously.

“He left me,” Bryce says morosely.

“I don’t believe you. Nobody ever willingly leaves you.”

“He went to the bathroom, so he’s as good as dead. Come dance with me; I’m lonely.” He wraps his hands around my waist and tugs at me gently—not enough to yank me off my stool, but enough to make my body sway slightly in time with the beat.

“I don’t want to dance.”

“Yes you do,” says Bryce. “I’ll protect you from the stampeding mob. Please?” He nuzzles into my neck, and because I’m drunk and it feels nice, I allow it, relishing in the momentary tingles that sprinkle my skin.

“I don’t like getting sweaty.”

“Stop lying,” says Bryce, and it’s almost a purr that makes me shiver, and apparently I’m _not_ immune to his sluttiness when he really puts in effort because when I turn around to glare at him and tell him to fuck off, he bites his lip and gives me Bambi eyes, and I might grunt as if I’ve just been socked in the stomach.

Anyway, I get off the dumb stool. My ass was starting to get numb from sitting too long, anyway. It doesn’t _mean_ anything.

“See, isn’t this nice?” Bryce shouts in my ear, tugging me into the bouncing mass of bodies on the dance floor.

“I want to die,” I tell him, falling against his considerable chest when someone accidentally bumps into me, nausea mixing with mild horniness which is… an odd sensation.

“That’s the alcohol,” he says. “Did you put down a tab? Do I need to steal your credit card back from the bartender?”

“Shut up,” I say, and to my surprise, he actually does, laughing into my ear and pulling me closer so that I’m plastered against his chest.

It’s… nice. His arms are tight, his chest is warm, and my dick is starting to get interested, which is _horrifying_.

He bends over to say in my ear, “There’s a dude! He’s looking at your butt. Do you want to go over and say hi?” He spins me around abruptly, still clinging tight to me so that his dick is pressed against the small of my back.

“No.”

“I think you should!” says Bryce. “He’s hot! He doesn’t look like Michael.”

“I don’t _want_ to!” I snap, and resist Bryce’s following shove so hard that I practically catapult back into him as soon as he takes his hand away, making him squawk and stumble.

Instead of getting all pissy about it, like I would’ve expected, one of his hands fists at my side, in the loose excess fabric of my shirt.

“Why not?” he says, and I’m drunk enough that I can’t tell if he sounds peeved or curious.

“Bryce,” I snap, “I didn’t come here to get _laid_!” ( _Your dick would like to argue otherwise, if it’s allowed to have any say in the proceedings_ , my brain says, raising a finger, and I tell it to fuck off.)

He curls his fingers in the long hair by the nape of my neck and tugs, forcing my head back so our eyes can meet without him having to double over, a grin playing on his lips. Maybe it’s just… the subservience of it, him making me do something, but I kind of like it, my skin going hot and tingly, and I wish for a second that he’d pull a bit harder. Just for a second, that’s all, and then I could run away to the bathroom and get my rocks off and then come back and pretend like nothing ever happened. Otherwise I’m going to start humping air, and that would just be humiliating. Ugh, why had I ever agreed to do this? Shots are five dollars here, which is stupidly expensive, and if I’d stayed home, I could be jerking off by now.

“Why not?”

“I don’t need to get laid!”

“Yes you do! You’re so cranky all the time.”

“Sex is not one of the requirements on Maslow’s hierarchy of needs!”

“Maslow was wrong,” says Bryce immediately.

“Tell me _more_ , Mr. Lawyer-who’s-never-taken-a-psychology-class-in-his-life!”

“Ouch, wow, keep talking to me _more_ like that, my ego _definitely_ needs to be taken down a hundred more pegs.”

“It does,” I say immediately, and I’m suddenly aware that I’m still looking at him, stuck in this bizarre position, and I shake my head to loosen his grip.

“You’re a bitch,” says Bryce fondly, his fingers dragging against my scalp (accidentally? _Accidentally? OR ON PURPOSE???_ ). “You’re lucky you have us as friends, ’cause no one else would want to hang out with you all the time.”

And that’s…

That’s probably true, and it abruptly makes me sick to my stomach. I know Bryce doesn’t mean it—we always say these sorts of things to each other, nasty little things sometimes, but who doesn’t? It’s just that sometimes, they hit too close to home, and I’m forced to think about how pathetic I actually am, because I can’t be bothered to get my own life together.

Everyone else already has their lives together, what’s wrong with me?

Bryce must notice something: of _course_ he notices something, there must be tears welling in my eyes— _Fucking cry-baby_ , says my brain, _what’re you gonna do about it, go run away to the bathroom and boo-hoo-hoo your heart out?_ —and though Bryce is almost as blind as Michael, he’s not half as stupid, and he leans down immediately, his hands going to my cheeks, his thumbs brushing under my eyes where wetness probably is, making them automatically flutter shut as my throat clenches.

“Lucky, hey. Hey, I didn’t mean it like that, I’m sorry.”

I open my mouth to say something devastatingly snarky to even out the playing field, but before I can get even so much as half a word out, he kisses me.

Everything stutters to a stop. The music, the strangers—everything.

It’s…

It’s not horrible.

It’s the _opposite_ of horrible, it’s mind-numbingly fantastic, because of course Bryce knows how to kiss considering how many men he’s hooked up with, and fine, so maybe I haven’t been kissed in a while, and I’ve kind of forgotten how good it can feel—tingly and sensitive, making my knees go all weak so I fall toward him and dig my fingers into his shirt.

Then, of course, because Bryce can’t lick my mouth forever sans interruption, my brain accidentally creates a thought with its alcohol- and endorphin-soaked neurons and screeches, _What about_ Michael _?!_

When I shove at Bryce, he budges more easily than I thought he would, stumbling a step or two back and taking me with him because my hands don’t want to listen to orders, and stay fixed in his shirt.

“What are you _doing_?!” I shriek, probably ruining my image of indignation with how breathless and frazzled I am.

“Um, kissing you?” he says, like he’s confused that I’ve pushed him away. He probably _is_ , I doubt he gets rejected all that often. My penis, meanwhile has stooped to the depths of begging for Bryce (and his thigh) to come back.

I open and close my mouth like a fish, which cannot be attractive at all.

He leans forward a little bit, and I’m very aware of how close our faces are—his nose almost touches mine, and I can feel each one of his exhales on my lips. For whatever reason, he looks very smug, his eyes half-lidded. “Did you not _like_ it?”

“It was— It was—it was _mediocre_ ,” I snap immediately, because he deserves that.

“Mediocre?” Bryce says, rearing back, absolutely outraged, and fists a hand in my hair, making my scalp sting, _yanking_ my head back this time and, wide-eyed, I think my mouth falls open; I’m abruptly ready to _go_ , because that’s the hottest thing that’s happened to me all night, no cap.

“Sorry,” I manage, too aware of how close my dick is to Bryce’s thigh, which is quite conveniently back between my legs, “were you looking for a comment more ego-boosting? If so, you’ll have to work harder. I require more maintenance than your usual fucks.”

Bryce scowls and drops his hand from my hair, which my dick immediately laments.

 _Oh my god!_ I yell at it. _You need priorities!_

 _I_ have _a priority!_ it yells. _Why are you chasing it off?_

_Bryce is not a priority!_

_Bryce is hot, single, and hitting on you for some fucking reason that I can’t rationalize. You’re going to chase that off for a man that smells like sweat and Pepto-Bismol and has_ smegma _?_

“I’m going to go find someone else who doesn’t insult me at every turn.” Bryce backs up a couple steps and I should be embarrassed about the way I cling to him, refusing to untangle my fingers from his shirt, because maybe my brain has a good point and this is a safe option that probably won’t end up with me murdered.

“No—”

“No?” he says, eyes glittering, and a vague part of me wants to wonder if I’m being played, while another part of me is low-key beginning to _want_ to get railed, which starts to become a terrifying thought when I properly consider that I may actually be _hitting_ on Bryce right now, so I just don’t think about it.

“I’ll graciously allow you a redo,” I say.

“You’re so considerate,” Bryce says, very dryly.

“Hurry up and do something before I get bored and leave,” I say, and I don’t know if he rolls his eyes or laughs—or both—before he leans down and kisses me again. It’s nice: soft and gentle, like he thinks I’m something that might shatter beneath his lips, and though I try to bite him to spice things up, it doesn’t work.

It still leaves me breathless.

By the time he pulls away, courtesy of some jackass cat-calling, I’m fairly sure the taste of alcohol has been permanently removed from my mouth, given how much licking around he’d been doing, which probably would have been gross had I not been drunk, but given that I _am_ , my brain is considering that this honestly isn’t so terrible, and why had I even started with Michael when I could’ve been having _this_?

I tell my brain to calm the fuck down because this isn’t about to become a permanent thing.

“Are we leaving?” I ask Bryce, scrubbing the back of my hand against my (wet) mouth.

“Leaving?”

“To go to your place.”

“Why would we go to my place?”

I very seriously consider punching him in the face to rattle his brain around in his skull to get it working, because there’s no way that Bryce is _this_ dense. “To fuck,” I said. “Pretty sure you just ate my face for like a minute straight. Does that not mean we’re going to fuck?”

“Maybe it was a pity kiss,” says Bryce, but he’s not very convincing, because I’m pressed up next to him and I can feel his dick.

“Fine,” I say, rather snippily. “Either take me home or pay for my taxi back to my house. I have a headache and I want to leave.”

Bryce bends down, his fingers curling around the back of my neck, and brings his mouth very close to my ear. I shiver: his breath is hot.

“It’s the alcohol,” he whispers.

It takes a moment for the words to register, but when they do, I sock him in the stomach. He grunts, staggering back, a loose grin on his face and his eyes pressed shut in self-satisfied glee.

“I hate you,” I say.

“Okay,” says Bryce, and decides, “we can fuck.”

“You don’t need to make it sound like a _chore_.”

“Neither do you. Are you going to get your card, or should I?”

“I’ll do it,” I snap, because I still don’t like the way Bryce and the bartender had been eyeing each other, and Bryce probably doesn’t _really_ want me either, he’s just drunk, and so if he goes back there and sees the bartender with all that junk in his trunk and then looks at _me_ , he’ll probably want me even _less_ , and leave me like Michael left me.

“Get mine too!” Bryce yells after me, and though I flip him off, I do. I shove the receipts and the cards in my pocket, because I’m one hundred percent unwilling to see how much money I’ve spent tonight on drinks, and when I find Bryce leaning against the wall by the entryway, he tells me he’s already ordered a taxi as he pulls me through the doors.

“Why are we going outside? It’s fucking _freezing_.”

“I want to kiss you some more, and I don’t want strangers watching like we’re pay-per-view porn, but cheap and free,” says Bryce, and pushes me up against the wall. I like the weight he puts against my chest with his palm, and because I’m an idiot with no coat, I can feel the very-slight scrape of his fingertips through my shirt. I want him to move his hand up to my throat, but I’m not trashy enough to start _begging_ for that, so I settle for sucking on his bottom lip so hard I’m sure it’s going to bruise.

We almost miss the taxi because things rapidly start becoming blurry when Bryce slides his hand up my shirt: the cold air bites my stomach, so I crowd closer, and he pushes me back harder, scraping his nails slowly along my skin, making me shiver and whimper from cold and the icy tingles that come from being _touched_ at a rate of three to five centimeters per second.

When Bryce pulls back from me, I make a disgruntled noise in protest. “What—”

“Taxi,” he says, waggling his phone at me, the blurry bright screen making me squint. “Am I allowed to put my hand down your pants in the back?”

“NO.”

“Not horny enough?” Bryce leers, his fingers sliding teasingly right under my waistband making me gasp and my hips twitch.

“Fuck off,” I say shoving his hand away, and he laughs, tilting his head back, baring his throat.

His hand might not end up in my pants, but it still ends up on top of my dick, which isn’t entirely unwanted but still mortifying given the forty-year-old Somalian man driving the car, _within earshot_ , whose eyes, after glancing back once in the rearview mirror, stay fixed with hyperintense (and probably horrified) focus on the road.

 _I’d like to die now_ , I think as I slouch down in the seat and Bryce’s hand slides down the inside of my thigh, tantalizingly slow.

 _You’re spreading your legs and not saying no, so you must want it_ , says my brain.

I hate that I’m apparently not drunk enough to make my brain shut off. What do I need to do, snort crack cocaine?

I wobble hastily out of the Lyft when it finally stops. Bryce pays, and lays his hand on the small of my back as we go up the drive; I slap it off and try to undo his belt, and he laughs, pressing me up against the door and worrying the lobe of my ear between his teeth, managing to use his keys at the same time. Because I’m stupid, I fall backwards when the door opens, and he has to lunge forward to save me; I attempt to make up for the lack of sexiness by _finally_ getting his stupid belt undone—seriously, why the fuck is he wearing it, he doesn’t even _need_ it, it’s not like he’s not a size where he can’t find pants that fit him at any given store—and yanking down the zipper of his fly.

“Oh my god—” he shoves the door shut behind us, “—do you _want_ to give the neighbors a show?”

“I’m getting tired of waiting,” I snap, kicking off my shoes on top of his.

“For fuck’s sake,” Bryce bites out, wobbling slightly as I slip my hand into his underwear and wrap my fingers around his dick, and it pleases me enormously to know he’s not unaffected by me. I’m sexy. He _wants_ me. Right? I’m not boring.

I slide my hand down his cock as best I can what with the limited space available to me; he’s not as big as Michael, but he’s not small, either. Just—normal. Or, like, what I’m presuming is normal. I haven’t really had a lot of experience with dicks other than porn and the freak of nature that Michael was endowed with.

“Why are you still wearing clothes?”

“Um, because we’re in my _kitchen_? We’re not having sex in here. I don’t want to be cleaning fluids up from my surfaces on a weekday. Chore day is Sunday, not Thursday morning.”

I open my eyes and glare at him as he digs my hand out of his pants and presses it to my chest, kissing me briefly on my cheek before pushing me through the dark house, clicking on a few lights in the hallway and then in his room.

“I can’t believe you have a designated chore day,” I manage as he slips a hand under my pants and squeezes my ass, making me whimper and want to start presenting myself. “Nerd.”

Bryce sighs and relocates his mouth to mine, effectively shutting me up while he kneads my ass, very quickly making me lose all capability for rational thought as he backs me up to his bed. Huh. Wow. Was this all it took to make my brain shut up? Maybe I _should_ get laid more often. I file that thought away for later (sober) consideration and shove my hands under Bryce’s shirt, trying to get it off him. Bryce (unlike a certain other person that we shall not be considering right now) doesn’t always wear button-downs, so it’s not like I can rip his shirt off without Hulk-like strength, and it also means that he needs to tear his mouth away so he can whip it over his head, offering me a condolence by pushing his knee in between my legs. I think that this is the most amazing thing to ever happen, barely managing to stop myself from humping him like a dog in heat, my fingers curled around the heated skin of his waist.

“Are you clean?”

“What?”

“Are. You. Clean?”

“Bryce,” I snap. “Of-fucking-course I am. Look at me. I haven’t had sex in two years, and before that, I was in an exclusive relationship with Michael, in which we always used condoms—”

“Too much information!” he yells. “I meant did you _wash_?”

I scowl at him. “Yes I washed, jackass.”

“Stop calling me names,” says Bryce, shoving me so that I very nearly face-plant into his bed, which smells like a Jo-Anne’s Fabrics foyer at the beginning of December and makes me want to cough. “That’s not my kink.”

“You don’t have any kinks,” I say immediately, shoving at the maroon covers and kicking them aside. They’re all slippery slidey, running through my fingers like water. Disgusting. What sane person has silk sheets? “You’re as vanilla as you are white.”

“Ouch,” says Bryce, yanking his covers back as he sees I’m getting absolutely nowhere with them, and leans over to press me to the bed, sealing his mouth over mine again in a manner that suggests he isn’t _really_ offended. _I_ ’m offended that I’m so quickly losing the ability to talk with the way his tongue slides against mine, especially when his hand makes its way down my stomach and slithers under my pants.

I moan incoherently as he wraps his hand around my dick, thumbing at the top of it and making me buck into his grip desperately before he pulls away cruelly to slide my pants all the way off, his fingers lingering against my skin and making me squirm, my dick slapping against my stomach when he yanks down my underwear.

“Pretty,” he says.

“Shut up,” I say.

“You don’t like complements?”

“I don’t like talking during sex.”

“Aw,” says Bryce, pulling the fakest frown ever. “But that’s just _not fun_.”

It’s also a fat lie. I totally like talking during sex. At least, I _had_ liked talking during sex, when _Michael_ had been doing it, because he knew how to give sexy orders and he could do this thing with his voice where he made it go all gravelly and deep and shivery, with the promise of punishment when I didn’t do what he asked.

I don’t think Bryce is a person who believes in punishment, even in sex games.

“You look like the kind of person who believes in positive reinforcement,” I tell Bryce, who’s taking off his pants.

“You’re so drunk,” he says, stumbling a little as he steps out of his jeans.

“So are you.” I kick at his thigh and mostly miss because I’m aligned wrong on this bed, and he wraps a hand around my ankle and pulls me closer to him, sucking a kiss onto my lips and then relocating to lick my nipple, which makes sparks zip under my skin.

I gasp and fist my hand in the long hair at the top of his head, making sure he stays down there, and when he leans over to pin me to the bed with his weight, I rock my dick up against his stomach, the friction just barely painful enough to make me whimper, open-mouthed, nearly hyperventilating as he _finally_ bites down.

“You’re loud,” he says. “I like it.”

“Don’t you have better things to be doing with your mouth other than talking?”

“Maybe.” He pulls back all the way— _why_ —leaving me panting, reeling from the abrupt lack of stimulation, and rescinds the hand on my chest to push me over to the center of the bed, fucking off completely to his chest of drawers so I don’t even have the heat of his skin pressing against mine. I scowl and shimmy out of my shirt.

“Roll over.”

“Fuck’s sake, really? I can’t just stay like this?”

“I want to appreciate your finer assets,” he says, in a tone that suggests if I my ass were already readily available, he’d be slapping it right about now.

I mutter a complaint but flip over, burying my head in my arms. “I don’t like your mouth,” I mutter.

“You will,” he promises, the bed creaking as he gets back on, bouncing over to where I am and pulling my hips up, digging the tips of his fingers into my cheeks for just a second before sliding down to my thighs, electrically slow, then drawing away. “Put your hands by the headboard.”

“Why?”

“Because I don’t want you to touch yourself.”

“Jesus fucking Christ,” I mumble into my arms, rearranging myself to his pleasure so that my cheek is smushed against a pillow, arching my back so my butt sticks out some more. “This is a horrible idea.”

“The worst,” Bryce agrees, palming my ass. His hands are warm and his thumb catches right by my hole, making me squirm. “But you’ve got me insanely hard, so…. Unless you _really_ have any objections?”

“Just fucking stick your fingers in me already,” I say, before I can regret it.

He laughs, his other hand going to my other cheek, and I’m about to ask him what the heck he’s doing—how he’s going to finger me if both his hands are busy—when he spreads me apart (hot, yes, but also humiliating as hell and my ass cheeks would now like to start a petition to update their privacy policy) and drags his tongue over my hole.

I cry out, embarrassingly loud; it feels insanely good: warm and wet and sensitive. It feels a lot better than the last time it happened, which had been _forever_ ago, because Michael was also a germaphobe and had barely ever agreed to do this when we were together (and only ever with a dental dam). I immediately want a lot more of it, but of course Bryce has a filthy mouth and is also a fucking tease, because he doesn’t do anything else: just flattens his tongue and keeps licking sinfully slow stripes up my taint to my hole, which isn’t enough for me to get off but is definitely enough for my dick to be very happy all of a sudden. I’m trying to buck into his mouth and get his tongue actually _in_ me or _something_ , but he just laughs and holds me down, one hand wrapped around my thigh and the other playing with my balls, getting them way too wet and sloppy on the spit that falls down.

By the time he shapes his tongue into a spear and wiggles it into my hole, I’m wailing, hands fisted in the sheets above my head, not sure if I want to pull myself away and jerk myself off, or ride his face until I come. I don’t even know if I’d even need to touch my dick to come at this point, if he’d just fucking _put something bigger in me_.

Bryce pulls back for a moment and I sob out some unintelligible protest.

“Enjoying yourself?” His thumb circles my hole and my dick jerks, desperately hopeful, but he doesn’t push in.

“Just _fuck_ me already!”

“Patience is a virtue,” he smirks, and goes back to using his tongue.

I’m dripping onto his sheets by the time he pushes one— _one_ —finger into me: a thin, clear thread of fluid hangs unbroken from the tip of my dick, oozing downwards. I’ve long since given up any premise of begging, because Bryce doesn’t seem to care about that at all and is more than content to take things at his own pace, which turns out to be excruciatingly slow.

I whimper and arch my back further, trying to push my ass into the air more and tease him to hurry up as he slides his finger in me, the chill of the lube making me clench around him slightly, but this doesn’t stop him because I swear to god with how much he’s rimmed me already, my hole is going to be loose and open for _days_. I’ll be a veritable walking pocket pussy, and my brain can’t help but to create completely fictional video shorts of Bryce cornering me outside my house and fucking me against the wall, no prep because I wouldn’t need it; or sneaking Bryce into my house and having him fuck me while my dad is a wall away; or going to brunch and having Bryce shove his way into the bathroom with me and make me suck him off; none of this makes any of my horniness dissipate. In fact, it is making it worse, and now I am also having a crisis, because none of those images fit into the imaginary thing I have going on in my head with me and Michael still.

Fuck, Michael is so going to kill us both if he ever finds out about this. _I_ ’m going to kill us when I wake up in the morning.

Bryce makes a cut-off groan. “Shit. Spread your legs more.”

Trying to not hyperventilate, I scoot my knees apart, my cheeks hot with thinking about the view I’m probably giving him; my dick bobs, ignored—and red and angry about it—under my stomach.

He crooks his finger as a reward, hitting my prostate like he’s done a body scan and has always known where it is. A strangled sound that I’ll be embarrassed about later falls out of my mouth without any warning.

“You make such pretty noises,” he says, dragging his finger out, ignoring the way I clench and squeeze around it, trying to stop him; the lube pretty much ensures that this is going to go his way, not mine, and that makes me want to cry, because I’m so _empty_. “I wish I could take a video. Fuck.”

“Don’t—don’t,” I gasp. Even though I have zero life, I don’t want porn of me circulating through the universe. That would just mean I would remain jobless _forever_ , as opposed to just being jobless in the near future.

“I won’t. I would never,” he reassures me, and before I can say anything else, he pushes three fingers in my hole with no preamble, and my eyes fly open and I jolt, a shocked cry coming from my mouth, because I’d at least expected him to be polite and go up one by one with the fingers, but no: I finally find myself abruptly full to the brim.

“Holy hell,” Bryce groans. “Are you made of _elastic_?”

I moan, too loud and pitched, when he hits my prostate again, my dick jerking, a drop of precum beading at the tip. “You’re the one who—who’s been teasing me for _years_.”

“It’s barely been fifteen minutes,” says Bryce, sliding his fingers in _deeper_ , and apparently my asshole is connected to my vocal cords because I can’t stop moaning; it feels _good_ ; I can’t go that deep with my own fingers and this is a more-than-welcome change of pace. My legs slide farther apart without my permission. “ _Fuck_. What have you been _doing_ in your spare time?”

“A lot of—a lot of masturbation,” I say, when I can catch my breath, and he just sits there for a moment, three fingers in me, opening for the world to see, leaving me panting and pathetic and spread open, cheek pressed into the sheets, my cock hard and leaking.

“Yeah, I can _tell_. How many fingers can you put inside yourself?”

I bury my face in his mattress and he scissors his fingers slowly, making me groan and clutch at his pillowcases, twisting my fingers into them until my hands sting. It doesn’t _hurt_ , what he’s doing, but I can _feel_ myself stretching, which is the oddest sensation ever, and it also has me harder than titanium.

“Lucky,” he says.

“I—All—all of them.”

“Holy fuck,” he moans, pulling out. I whine: it’s too soon, I want more; I try to follow him, but he puts his other hand on my ass and shoves me back where he wants me. “You fist yourself?”

“I—sometimes,” I whimper. Then, squawked as my brain attempts to stutter online through alcohol and endorphins: “You are _not_ fisting me! Your hands are enormous!”

“I wasn’t gonna,” Bryce soothes me, and then his fingers are back at my hole, pressing and massaging until I the muscle inevitably gives, because I’m a slut. “Shit, that’s hot, though.” He presses four fingers into me and I can feel it now; my hole stings pleasantly as it stretches. “I can picture that: your whole hand in you, your rim clenched around your wrist. How do you come? Do you jack yourself off while doing that?”

I’m panting raggedly, eyes closed to hide the tears there, as he strokes his fingers rhythmically over my prostate, my dick drooling steadily now, and if he keeps going like this, I’m not going to have any come left by the time he actually sticks his cock in me. It’ll all have leaked out.

“I—I spread my fingers.”

“Like this?” he does it— _fuck, fuck, fuck_ —and I cry out, convulsing and nearly coming, because my body has spent several months conditioning itself to come untouched when I do that (not on purpose, I just still have zero self-control).

“Bryce!”

He sounds so smug when he says, “Yeah, what?” and does it _again_ , because apparently he likes the way I wail and the way my cock burbles out precum. “Do you have any complaints?”

I try to push myself up and he puts a hand between my shoulder blades, shoving me back down like it’s no effort at all on his part, which of course my stupid body finds incredibly hot, and I buck back on his fingers, trying to get some stimulation, because he’s stopped moving, fingers buried in me.

“Uh-uh, keep your hands up,” he says. “Am I not providing enough incentive for you? Because if not, I’m sure I can find some handcuffs _somewhere_ in this house.”

“Why the fuck… do you have… handcuffs?” I manage to pant out, grinding back on him, because he either hasn’t noticed me doing this yet or is allowing me to do it, and I don’t care about either because it feels _amazing_ ; he has long, thick fingers, and though four already hurts in an appealing way, the incredibly turned-on part of my brain wants him to work in his thumb, too, just to see what that would feel like.

“I stole them from a one-night stand,” he says, crooking his fingers and dragging them across my prostate again, making me wail unabashedly like that spot’s a button labeled, ‘Press here for Lucky to make noise.’ “He was a bitch, so I don’t feel bad about it. Do you _want_ me to get them? It might take a while, but I can definitely let you sit here with a vibrator in your ass until I find them. You _will_ have to promise not to touch your cock, though.”

That is a tempting thought—so tempting—but it reminds me too much of what me and Michael would do, playing around, seeing how long we could tease each other before we would come, and I shake my head, in part desperately and in part trying to furiously blink back the tears welling in my eyes even as I buck my dick into the air, searching for friction as he massages my prostate. Why can I not forget about Michael? I’ve definitely had more than enough shots tonight to get blackout drunk and I’m in bed with his _best friend_ right now, for fuck’s sake. “No—no, fuck, _anhh_ , I thought you were going to be fucking me. Are you just going to finger me—finger me off? Are you not—not confident in your ability to— _Ahh!_ —perform?”

Bryce, who _always_ rises to the bait, does not allow me to goad him on for some reason. Maybe he’s having too much fun kneading my prostate and making me sing opera. “No, I’m definitely going to fuck you,” he says, conversationally. “I’m having a lot of fun watching you come apart, though. Are you always so desperate for cock? All I’ve done is rimmed and fingered you, and you’ve been begging for my dick the whole time. I’m sure you’ve done more intense stuff than this.”

A flush of shame seizes me, making my dick harder. I _have_ , but that was _years_ ago, when Michael was still in the picture, and at least Bryce is smart enough not to mention him, because nothing would kill the mood faster.

“You know I haven’t, _haah_ , had sex in two years,” I snap, rocking my hips in time to his thrusts. If he keeps going with this, I’m not even going to have to wait to come, because I can just pretend that his fingers are his cock. “Don’t blame—don’t blame me for being easy. You were a mess when you hadn’t had sex in two mon— _Unhh!_ Oh _god_ , _please_!” My voice breaks as he does something with his fingers that feels so good it has me sobbing and lunging for my dick, but he grabs my wrists in one hand and pins me to the bed, like this is my punishment for mouthing him off. In this situation, Michael would’ve spanked me or some shit—made me hurt, the way I liked; maybe he would’ve slapped my hole until it was red and puffy before burying his dick in me—but Bryce apparently is one of those people who believes in pleasure being both torture and a reward.

“What was that?” Bryce says sweetly, his breath tickling my ear. His grip around my wrists is just tight enough to make my skin sting, but I’m not worried that he’s about to be crushing my bones anytime soon; it’s just that I can’t _move_ , and I would very much like to move right now so I can jerk off and fucking _come_.

“ _Bryce_!”

“What?”

“Oh my god, fuck me already, or I’m going to _cut_ you!”

“Keep swearing at me and we’re going to be here for _longer_ ,” he says pleasantly. “I know you’re having fun, I can see it, and I’m having fun, too. Apparently, I also have more stamina than you. Not that I’m not finding it attractive.”

“Fucking _Christ_ ,” I growl through gritted teeth, yanking at his hands hard enough that my skin turns red. He squeezes my wrists tighter with a breathy laugh, thrusting once more with his fingers before drawing them out. A dribble of lube follows them out and slides down my thigh leisurely; I turn my head into the mattress to muffle my groan, almost missing the crinkle of a condom wrapper.

As I am an opportunist, I go for my dick the second he lets me go.

“No—” Bryce grabs me before I’ve managed to get one pump in, pinning me down and making me shriek in anger.

“Whatever stupid kink you’ve got going on with orgasm denial, I _fucking hate it_ ,” I snarl at him.

“Orgasm denial?” Bryce mocks, hopefully lining up his dick already. “Spending a lot of time on Literotica lately, are we?”

“I hate you.”

“No,” says Bryce. “Take that back. I won’t let you turn this into hate-fucking.”

“I hate you, I hate you, I hate you!”

“I regret this already,” says Bryce. “Stop squirming.”

“Or what, you’ll spank me?” I snap.

Bryce sounds almost academically curious when he asks, “Do you _want_ to be spanked?”

I stop moving, pressing my cheek against the hot sheets and breathing hard. I can’t really see him from where I’m stuck against the bed, but I can feel everywhere he’s touching me: one hand binding my wrists, his fingers tight; and his knees against the side of my calves, nudging my legs wide. Each point is too sensitive, doubly so because he isn’t _moving_ , and I can feel my cock throbbing, aching to just be done already. Some days are good for teasing, and perhaps today could have been one of those days under any other circumstances, but I suddenly feel too raw and strung-out, and if I weren’t aroused, I’d just want to switch off the light and lay in the dark for a while.

“Can you just… can you just fuck me already?” I say, quietly.

He’s silent for a moment. “Okay,” he says softly. “Do you want to stop?”

“Bryce,” I snap, bucking, immediately irritated, needing to goad him into doing this. Does he not want me even though he brought me home, is that why he’s asking? “Are you motherfucking _deaf_?”

He snorts, then loosens his grip on my wrists. “Hands on the headboard, then.”

“I still hate you.”

“No you don’t.”

I put my hands on the headboard, because I need this dicking to be over, and this is a small price to pay. He—finally—presses the head of his dick against my hole gently, teasing, slipping down between my legs and down my taint, making me turn my face into his pillows and groan.

“Kind of want to wonder…”

He doesn’t finish, instead sighing comfortably and sliding the tip of his dick into my hole and sitting there, still as fucking stone, until I squirm impatiently, clenching, wanting _more_.

He pulls out with an obscene _pop_ and I very nearly shout from frustration, trying to shove myself back into his lap.

“Quit it,” he says, nudging me back up, and I would’ve snapped something at him had he not finally reached for my dick, sliding his hand up and down a few times, which immediately has me three seconds away from coming and thrusting into his hand helplessly, slicked with my precum, like my body was never really my own in the first place, always just a slave to his whims.

“Oh god, please—in—already—”

He pushes in, all the way this time, punching a hiccupping groan out of me, as I’m unsure of whether to get away or cram closer for more. Bryce moans, hitched, and rocks his hips slightly, nudging my ass up _higher_ , and because I can’t have two good things at the same time, lets go of my cock.

I want to cry. It hangs, furious and abandoned, between my legs, pointing toward my navel, and I desperately want to collapse against the bed so I can hump _something_ until I come, because I can feel myself hovering on that knife’s edge.

“S’good for you?” Bryce asks, slightly slurred, one hand back on my ass, spreading me open _still_ , and I have to wonder how obscene that looks, his dick pumping into my hole, which is slick enough that I can hear the sloppy sounds of it every time he moves, like I’m in some animated porno.

“It’ll be good for me when you make me co- _ome_ , _anh_!” He shoves in, making my voice break. “Why are you going so _slow_?”

“I like slow.”

“Well, I hate it!”

“We can’t all be a jackhammer, Jesus. What do you want me to do, just hook you up to a machine and leave you here getting pounded all day?”

It’s an arousing image—not that I’m going to admit that—being helpless like that. Though, preferably, I’d also be tied up so I wouldn’t be able to get away, and I’d have no choice but to take it, either balanced on the edge of coming or being forced to come too many times. It would definitely be three times better if there were people there to watch. Maybe one certain person, specifically there to praise me at odd intervals and tell me I was doing a good job and slide his fingers along my rim, feeling the dildo pump in and out, and maybe slip them in alongside, though he wouldn’t let me go even if I begged—

Holy fuck, this is so getting out of control.

Bryce chooses this terrible moment to thrust in and accidentally hit my prostate head-on, and I wail, scrabbling at the pillows.

“It sounds tempting,” muses Bryce, like he’d been reading my thoughts the whole time, which is a horrible, _horrible_ thought, “but I’m not into the whole sex-slave idea thing? Are you into that?”

Why the fuck does Bryce think that now is the best time to be having a conversation, when I’m currently drooling all over his sheets? He’s finally fucking speeding up, his fingers digging into the soft flesh at my hips, denting the skin, and yanking me back against him.

It’s too much, because it’s been ages since I haven’t needed to do any work to get pounded, and my hole is too sensitive and _full_ , and I’m going to fucking pass out from feeling good, without even coming.

“Can I please—need to—need to— _Bryce_ —”

He groans, and the second he wraps his hand around my dick, I’m done. I would be ashamed about coming so fast, but as it is, my jaw locks open so hard I’m afraid it’s going to dislocate, sobbing as I shove fruitlessly forward into his tight grip, my body automatically milking this opportunity for all that it’s worth.

Vaguely, I can hear Bryce swearing, fingernails cutting into my skin pleasingly as I go limp, hauling me up so he can keep using me. Every thrust is punctuated with the sharp, metallic pinch of overstimulation and I squirm in his grip, moaning, until he shoves me flat against the bed and slams in a few last times, his teeth latching onto my shoulder and making me cry out, rubbing myself desperately against the sheets.

I don’t come again, but it’s like scratching an itch, and it’s pleasing to lay there and let my hips twitch against the bed, whimpering, riding out the last aftershocks. My brain is white noise, everything blurry when I open my eyes, so I just keep them closed and bask in the endorphins and Bryce’s weight on top of me, his rasping breath hot against the back of my neck.

He very politely takes his teeth off me. “Sorry.”

I think I mumble something incoherent, and a moment later, feel his weight lift. Honestly, I’m not paying too much attention. Everything is swirling and soft and dark, and I can’t pinpoint the exact moment when I stop remembering anything at all.

* * *

When I open my eyes, they’re still crusty, and I can make out faint sunlight filtering in through the blinds, sweeping over me like gentle hands. Only, they’re not super gentle because I fucking hate the sun and I have a pounding headache and my mouth is drier than the desert and tastes like someone’s shoved a dead animal in there and I’m sure I’m about to die if I miraculously don’t puke out my guts, first.

Why is there sun? I have blackout curtains.

I swivel my head to glare at my window and just sit there for a second, squinting and staring.

That’s not my window.

Those aren’t my blinds, either. And that’s not my wall. And that’s not my table, and that’s not—

Point being: I’m not in _my_ house.

I squint at the ceiling for a moment. Then I sit up abruptly, clutching the thick blanket to my chest, squeezing my eyes shut and desperately trying to ignore how this makes my headache worse, like there’s someone going at it with hammers and chisels in my head because they’re finally evicting my brain from its home in my skull. My stomach lurches and I swallow down bile.

I’m naked, I have a hangover, I’m in someone else’s bed, and my ass is sore.

Fantastic.

I open my eyes and twist around to see what sorry man I landed who can now claim the extraordinary title of Only Other Dude I’ve Ever Had Sex With Besides Michael and—

I scream and throw myself off the bed so fast that I trip and fall, smashing my joints on the floor.

“Whaaat?” Bryce groans from the bed while I scramble to the wall, pressing myself back against it, clutching a thin sheet to my chest and hyperventilating underneath the window.

Then I figure: life is short, and life is also about to be a lot shorter because I’ve just _had sex with my ex’s best friend_ , and I’m _mad_ —I’m _mad_ -mad, how the hell had _that_ happened?! So much adrenaline is coursing through my veins that I can almost forget that I’ve got a splitting headache.

“BRYCE!” I screech, launching myself off the floor.

He barely has time to mumble, “Whattimeizzit?” and roll over halfway before I’ve got my hands fisted in cloth and I brain him with one of his pillows.

He yelps and jerks, flailing awake with an indignant squawk.

“What the—what—”

“You piece of shit!”

He grunts when I hit him with the next swing and grabs at me, somehow managing to wrestle me away from my weapon, chucking it onto the floor on his side of the bed while he tries to peel open squinty eyes.

I go for a new pillow.

“What the fuck—”

“You— _asshole_!” I swing at him again and get him square on the mouth; he sputters and yanks that pillow out of my grip too and shoves me onto the opposite side of the bed after chucking it away so I can’t start going for the ones under his head.

“What the hell—stop—”

I shriek in anger as he rolls over on top of me, taking the sheets with him, and pins me to the mattress, squashing me completely and totally, which my monkey brain likes because it can’t seem to discern the difference between when this happens with Michael and when this happens with… with _someone ELSE_ , and I kick at Bryce’s legs, trying to toss him off me before I can get another burgeoning erection.

“ _Chill_ ,” he moans against my neck, his lips brushing the skin there, and I punch him in the throat.

Bryce makes this weird, choking groan and reels backward; I fling myself off the bed, yanking the sheets after me so hard that I’m surprised they don’t tear, but I sure as fuck need them more than _he_ does right now, because I’m _naked_! And in Bryce’s _bedroom_! _Naked_! We had _sex_!

“Mother _fucker_ ,” groans Bryce, glaring, his hand on his neck.

“BRYCE! WHAT DID YOU DO?”

“What did _I_ do? You _asked_ me to fuck you!” he yells.

I search frantically for memories… that aren’t there. “Oh, fucking shit balls,” I breathe, horrified. “I can’t remember!”

“I can,” says Bryce. “Bits and pieces. You—”

“Don’t tell me,” I snap immediately. “I don’t want to fucking know how on earth I found _you_ attractive.”

“Ouch,” says Bryce, very wounded, falling back down to bed and pulling the comforter up to his neck, looking to the ceiling. “Can we please put the insults on hold until I’ve had my morning coffee? I like to wake up in a positive environment. It helps me better adjust to the day.”

“Whatever,” I snap, gathering the sheets more firmly around myself in case he decides to yank them back.

“Why are you so pissed off?” Bryce says, slightly more testily than usual. “It was just a fuck. I’m not looking for a boyfriend.”

“Neither am I!”

“Well, good. See? What’s the issue then?” Bryce sits up, flinging his comforter to the opposite side of the bed. My eyes immediately go to his dick, which is a little pinker than the rest of his skin and limp and wrinkly and kind of falling between his legs and—

HOLY FUCK, why am I even _looking at it_! Do I _still_ want him?!

I rip my eyes away, horrified, hoping he doesn’t notice.

“So we had sex. I bet friends have sex all the time.”

“Yeah, and then they all live happily-ever-after with their boning partner after going through some minor inconvenience that they defeat with the sparkly power of true love!”

“Okay, first of all,” says Bryce, pushing himself off his bed and giving me a good look at his ass as he makes for his closet. “You watch too many romcoms. There’s no such thing as true love. Second of all, we are not _boning partners_ , because after your very violent freak-out from two minutes ago, I’m fairly sure I don’t want a repeat performance—”

“Neither do I,” I snap immediately, to make it even, ignoring how the comment smarts.

 _Ha-ha, even your one night stand doesn’t think you were a good fuck_ , mocks my brain.

“Great.” Bryce pulls on gray sweatpants. “So we’ve reached the conclusion: this means nothing, it was just a fantastic pit stop on your travel destination right back into Michael’s arms. Albeit, a pit stop we probably shouldn’t mention to him—”

“Oh my god, _MICHAEL_ —”

“—since neither of us want to proactively _die_ , so I’m going to need you to keep your mouth shut on that for me.”

“For _you_? You’re acting like he wouldn’t stab me through the heart for that too!” I glance around at Bryce’s floors, trying to figure out where the fuck my clothes from last night have gone.

“Please,” Bryce says, and a moment later, one of his t-shirts slaps me in the face, making me sputter and reel back. “He’d never lay a hand on you. Well, unless you asked him to, of course.”

I scowl at him. “Is this discourse on my kink?”

“We don’t need to discuss it,” says Bryce, looking far more Zen than he should be, while my guts twist all up inside me, screaming that I’ve just betrayed Michael, and I search his face to try and get a sense of if he’s feeling the same guilt as me.

I can’t see any.

“You want to shower?” asks Bryce. “I don’t think we cleaned up too well last night. Well, me, that is, since you passed out right after. I feel sticky in odd places.”

“ _You_ do,” I snap, avoiding thinking about whatever mess my butthole currently is in, but it’s definitely an uncomfortable situation: crusty and slippery (still, what kind of fucking _lube_ did he have?!) and one hundred percent gross.

“Can you please get out of my sheets?”

“I’m not wearing your shirt.”

“Fantastic. Go wash then. This entire room still somehow smells like sex and I need to make that un-happen before the kids come over for dinner tonight.”

“I’m not washing in your shower!”

“There’s another bathroom down the hall. Are you going to go on your own, or am I going to have to bathe you, too?”

“I literally don’t want to even see you again this morning. Or for the foreseeable future.”

“Aw, too bad,” Bryce mocks, crossing his room to unlatch one of the windows and yank it wide open—in the middle of _fucking_ winter, letting all the _freezing cold air_ inside. “You’re in _my_ house.”

I glare at him—he’s not looking, busy opening another window—and flounce out of the room, attempting to slam the door after me, but I fail miserably because I nearly catch the linens in the jamb and, knowing Bryce, he’d definitely throw a hissy fit if I fucked up his thousand-plus thread count sheets.

Jesus fuck, what’s _wrong_ with me that I run straight into _Bryce_ ’s arms when I’m feeling a little bad about myself!

I attempt to stamp down the quelling nausea in my throat and lock myself in the bathroom, starting the shower and making an effort to fold Bryce’s queen-sized sheets before I realize that I’m far too small, give up, and dump them on the floor, leaning over and resting my forehead on the sink counter for a moment, the stone freezing against my skin. Bile rises in my throat and I remind myself that it would _definitely_ be ass manners to throw up in someone’s shower.

Oh god, Michael’s going to be so pissed, who does that, who sleeps with their _ex’s best friend_? That’s against the bro code, which I only vaguely understand because I am very gay, while Michael and Bryce are practically the frat-bros of homosexuality, only two times as powerful because they fuck _and_ are smart.

Shit, what’s he going to do when he finds out? Break into my dad’s house at two a.m. and try to shoot me because if he can’t have me, nobody else can? Blacklist me from working at every single company in the world? Can lawyers have that kind of power? To ban me from being employed? Probably. Lawyers are devils. Or maybe he’ll go after Bryce and murder him or something, and make it onto the evening news—

 _No, be_ realistic, I snap at my brain.

He’ll probably just get… pissed or something, and whine about it on social media like every other millennial, and that’ll be that. And y’know what? Fine. Whatever. That’s probably even for the _best_ , because then he’ll be as pissed at me as I am at him, and we can both bite our thumbs at each other for the rest of our lives.

Screw him, he _so_ deserves to feel bad about it.

For a hot second, I consider gloating about it, just to rub it in his face, before tossing the idea in the trash, because that would _realistically_ make Michael go after Bryce and nothing good would happen because Michael has a way of making whatever anger management Bryce learned at therapy go right out the window, and things get very punchy very fast. I am not a boxing referee, I am a small queer Asian-American man who prefers mimosas over martial arts.

Currently, however, the thought of alcohol makes me _more_ nauseous, and I wheeze in a breath through my mouth, wondering if I should just go sit over the toilet for a while.

 _No, I’ll be fine_ , I try to convince myself, and get in the tub.

I spend the shower in a state of misery that not even hot water can wash away, but at least I don’t puke, though the steam makes my nausea worse, and when I get out, I’m forced to open the windows before I remember that I’m very naked and Bryce has neighbors, and have to go through every single one of the cupboards in the bathroom before finding the stack of neatly folded towels and perusing one.

“I want to _die_ ,” I moan, sticking my head outside, watching steam fizzle up from my skin into the cold February air.

As if summoned, Bryce pounds on the door, nearly making me fall over. “Hey, do you want coffee or something?”

“I want to _die_ ,” I repeat, affronted that Bryce doesn’t sound as sick as I.

There’s a little pause.

“Well that definitely is not good,” says Bryce, “but I can’t condone your death. French roast or hazelnut? Condensed milk or no?”

“Water and forty Advils,” I say.

“Okay,” says Bryce. “You’re going to need to come out of the bathroom for that, though. From what I can glean from the moisture sneaking out from the door, it’s so hot and warm in there that the Advil would probably melt as soon as I brought it in. I have abandoned my bedroom if you would please recollect your clothes.”

“Great,” I mutter, and plaster my cheek against the window frame, the slight movement sending my stomach roiling. Fuck, why is it getting _worse_? I’d been joking about it, but I actually feel like I’m about to keel over. Should I stick my finger down my throat just to throw up and see if that’ll make me feel better?

I decide on no and haul myself pathetically out of the bathroom. Bryce is moving around in the kitchen, his bare feet quiet on the floorboards, which my aching skull is thankful for. His bedroom door is closed, and when I open it, I get slapped in the face with a blast of freezing air, which is incredibly refreshing, abating some of the nausea, but also making me shiver like a whippet.

He’s draped my clothes over the footboard. They don’t exactly smell _good_ , when I press my nose to the cloth (sweatJägercinnamonsournesslavendar), but they’re not too horrible, so I suck it up and figure that I’ll be hauling my sorry ass home soon anyway, and probably taking another shower when I get there, so I won’t be in these clothes for long.

I don’t know where to put the towel, so I just chuck it over the footboard, replacing my clothes, and finger comb through my damp hair before forcing myself away from the bed. I need to leave Bryce’s house and return to my house and then go back to bed in _my own room_ , and then preferably not wake up for the next fifty years.

“Oh, you’re still alive,” says Bryce, as I haul myself into the kitchen.

“My mouth tastes like ass, and your bedroom is Antarctica,” I mutter, itching inside for some reason, fidgety and unsure of where I’m supposed to put my eyes, because I don’t want to look at him and seem thirsty, but I don’t want to stare at an inanimate object while I talk to him and be deemed a bitch.

“Here,” says Bryce, handing over a glass of water and the entire jumbo bottle of Advil. “Do you want a toothbrush?”

“No,” I say, snatching the water and painkillers. “This is how it starts, with you giving me water and toothbrushes and letting me shower at your house, and the next thing you know, we’re going to be engaged and planning a honeymoon to Paris. Stop being nice to me!”

Bryce wrinkles his nose. “I don’t like Paris. The French are assholes to Americans, which, as an American, I believe is entirely deserved because we’re actual pieces of shit, but also as an American, I am very offended.”

“ _Parle-toi bien français?_ ”

“ _Je pourrais si j’étudiais plus_ ,” he says, with an accent that’s _way_ better than mine, which just makes me feel bad about myself.

I cover this up like any other champ would: “Lame.”

“Take your Advil, sad boy,” Bryce says, exasperated, taking the bottle of ibuprofen back from me after I pour too-many of the little red tablets into my hand. They’re sweet on my tongue and I swallow them dry, practically chugging my water afterwards as Bryce sips at the last of his coffee, turning away to shove the bottle back into his cupboards, far higher than I would have been able to reach without the help of at least one stool and a chair.

“You should eat something, Advil taken away from food can cause stomach ulcers. Do you want cereal? A muffin? Scrambled eggs?”

“No,” I say, because if I eat something, I’m going to vomit in his sink.

Bryce must be able to see I’m green around the gills, because: “Do you want me to open more windows?”

“No.”

“Want me to call Michael and have him come pick you up?”

I practically leap out of my socks, which has the added detriment of nearly making me fall over, and glare at him incredulously, nearly flinging my cup at his head. “Are you out of your _mind_?” I hiss, as if Michael an actually hear us.

Bryce smirks. “Just wanted to check your current mentality.”

“I fucking hate you. What are you _thinking_? If he comes here he’s _definitely_ going to know we had sex!” I immediately regret bringing it up; will Bryce think I want a repeat if I keep bringing it up?!

“Or we could’ve just been having a fun sleepover.”

“There’s no such thing as a fun sleepover with a sexual predator.”

“I’m not a sexual predator,” Bryce says, offended. “Everyone I have sex with has loudly and vocally consented to said sex.”

“I want to not talk about it.” I decide to add this problem to the pile of problems that I am currently ignoring the fuck out of. It’ll go away on its own eventually, and if it doesn’t then I’ll just start to ignore Bryce until it goes away. Maybe I’ll move to Moldova while I’m at it, but that’s currently optional. I’ll see how bad the situation gets.

“You’re the one who brought it up!”

“Yes, and I’m not in love with you,” I say loudly and slowly.

Bryce scowls. “The feeling is mutual. I thought we already had this talk already. What does it say about you that you’re the only person I’ve slept with that I’ve _needed_ to have this talk with?”

“What does it say about _you_?”

“I’m a player and you’re insecure,” answers Bryce promptly. “Glad we’ve got that all figured out. I won’t be engaging in any acts of intimacy with you ever again. I think I’ve just been insulted more than I have been in the past three years, and that’s not even counting what little I can remember from last night.”

“I’m sure your ego is weeping.”

“I want you out of my house,” Bryce decides, starting away from his counter and making for his coat, strung up on the wall next to the kitchen. “You’re bad for my psyche. Here, I can drive you home. Or class. Do you have class?”

“I don’t have class,” I lie smoothly.

 _Oh god, does he know?_ my brain screams. _Does he know? He knows! Fuck, he knows, he knows—_

 _HE DOESN’T KNOW!_ I scream back. _Can you chill out!_

 _HE KNOWS! Quick, you need to make up a fake college schedule that’s believable! What classes are you going to fake-take? Intermediate digital drawing? Calculus? No, you suck at calculus. Algebra?_ Algebra _?? FRENCH?_

“Home then.”

“You’re too kind,” I say, wishing I could bitch-slap my brain. “I’m sure I can call a taxi.” Or just walk, in the absence of money, considering how many drinks I’d probably had last night. Anything would be better than Bryce’s driving, especially while he’s coming off a hangover. Especially while _I_ ’m coming off a hangover.

“I’m not _that_ kind,” he says. “It’s just good manners.”

“ _Really_ , you don’t have to do that. I’m _fine_.”

He looks at me and narrows his eyes at whatever he sees on my face. A sharp smile slides onto his mouth and he lifts his keys out of his pocket, jingling them. “But I _insist_.”

For fuck’s sake.


End file.
